Eileen Gray, Villa E-1027, 06190 Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, Alpes-Maritimes, France, 1929
Eileen Gray, Villa E-1027, 06190 Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, Alpes-Maritimes, France, 1929
This house located in France is a Gray’s and Badovici’s join of efforts. There’s no possible distinction of each one’s work although Gray also designed the furniture for the house, including a tubular steel table which would enable her sister to eat breakfast in bed without leaving crumbs on sheets, due to an adjustable top that caught the crumbs. This is considered to be Gray’s first major work, making indistinct the border between architecture and decoration.
The house’s purpose were to be a summer house and every room’s window exit is for a balcony or terrace, showing Gray’s intention to interact the natural elements and the house.
The main level of the house consists of a large open living room with a sleeping alcove and shower area for guests, a study/boudoir and bedroom, bath, and indoor and outdoor kitchens. The lower level consists of a large covered sitting area, a guest bedroom, housekeeper’s quarters, and a WC.
Gray took issue with Le Corbusier’s dictum that “the house is a machine to live in.”. She described the house as a living organism, an extension of the human experience, stating that “it is not a matter of simply constructing beautiful ensembles of lines, but above all, dwellings for people.” “Formulas are nothing,” she insisted, “Life is everything. And life is simultaneously mind and heart.”
Bibliographical References:
Adam, Peter. 1998. The adjustable table E 1027 by Eileen Gray. Frankfurt am Mein: Form.
Badovici, Jean and Gray, Eileen. 19..? E. 1027, maison en bord de mer. Paris: Morance.
References:
Reviewed by Irmina Gerełło, March 2017.