Step inside the Notting Hill home that doubles as a gallery
Exploring Brigitta Spinocchia Freund’s art-filled Notting Hill villa is like embarking on a journey of design discovery. The interior architect and collector treats her home – which she shares with her husband, their three children and a trio of toy poodles called Pepsi, Fanta and Sprite – as an ever-changing gallery space.
Freund, who runs a renowned eponymous interiors practice, has impeccable taste: her clients regularly trust her to curate their art collections, and she uses projects (currently at the luxury developments Chelsea Barracks and the Whiteley) to support emerging artistic talents, such as Darcey Fleming, Kesewa Aboah and Kasia Wozniak.
In her own lobby, a sketch by Tracey Emin ("She’s such a magnetic character") takes pride of place on a Fornasetti chest of drawers. On the Vincenzo De Cotiis marble table, there is a piece of pottery made by her youngest daughter Liberty. "The New York gallerist Ralph Pucci came to visit and was drawn to it," Freund tells me. "He said, 'This is incredible – who made it?' And a conversation about how age doesn’t matter unfolded. It’s always about the art, not how old the maker is."
Her children have influenced the house in other ways, too. Frogs are a recurring motif: Mary McCartney’s photograph of her mother Linda saving one from the road hangs on a wall, while a crocheted amphibian by Joana Vasconcelos faces the door for good fortune. "Their presence has evolved from my daughters’ love of frogs. When we lived in the country, they kept bringing them into the house," Freund says, laughing.
Born in England, Freund spent the first six years of her life in Istanbul, where her Italian father and Greek mother owned a store filled with Eastern European artisan pieces. They later set one up in Dorset, and Freund’s earliest memories are of visiting fleamarkets and bazaars with her parents. "I only spoke Turkish and Greek when I came to school here. I’m also quite dyslexic, so that was a tough start," she recalls. "But our house was constantly filled to the brim with interesting objects. Design has always had a huge impact on me, and my parents instilled a love of creativity in me from a very young age.
"Art brings me joy," adds the designer, who is a judge at PAD London and works closely with the Sarabande Foundation. "I have to keep learning, discovering and trying new things." Her arresting acquisitions even take precedence over the structure of her home: the swimming pool was designed around a specially commissioned installation by the Cuban collective Los Carpinteros.
Freund – ineffably chic in person, and a patron of the British Fashion Council Foundation – approaches her wardrobe with the mindset of curating collectable investments to enjoy, sell or donate after time. "Something doesn’t necessarily have to belong to you for a lifetime," she says. "Whether it is passed down the generations or you decide to sell it, you can recirculate an item of beauty without losing too much value. That’s the joy of buying good pieces."
Downstairs, a separate closet houses her fashion archive, while in the master bedroom, sensational, showroom-worthy glazed wardrobes crafted by Edsons Joinery display clothes such as a corseted Alexander McQueen gown and an early Schiaparelli jacket, complete with a pair of matching gloves. "It’s so you can appreciate what you have, even though you might not use everything on a day-to-day basis," she says. Inside these cabinets, the classic
complements the quirky: Chanel bags of many hues sit alongside a Dior bowler hat from the 1990s, and a candy-coloured bracelet made by her daughter is wrapped around the handle of a Birkin.
"I remember ordering my Schiaparelli [Trompe L’Oeil] shoes after seeing Daniel Roseberry’s autumn/winter 2021 collection," she says. "They were on pre-order for six months and when they finally arrived, they felt like a masterpiece to be displayed in a vitrine." There are many covetable highlights – a 1980s Dior mini-dress and a 1990s Vivienne Westwood corset being but two – but alongside the show-stoppers are designs of comfort and practicality. "It’s funny – when I was younger, I was much more adventurous. Now my staple is always a jacket, jeans or a suit," says Freund, who loves The Row for tailoring and Skiim for leather. "I remember saying to Alex Eagle that her suit is like wearing a tracksuit or pyjamas – it’s so comfortable and you still feel good in it."
Rare, often antique jewellery is also a passion; favourites include a striking gold collar by Slim Barrett that was taken from the designer’s archive and remodelled, and a precious scarab on coral from Burlington Arcade. Freund is looking forward to paying a visit soon to the Louisa Guinness gallery, which specialises in the work of sculptors and artists who have diversified into jewellery. Other favourite haunts are markets, from Paris’ Marché aux Puces de Saint-Ouen to the Feriköy in Istanbul, or online iterations such as the RealReal, Vestiaire Collective and Jerome Vintage.
But of all the possessions in Freund’s home, the most precious is the vast selection of reference books in her subterranean library. This is a treasured space with an elegant leather floor and Chesterfield sofas, where the family congregate to read or listen to vinyl records, surrounded by volumes on art and fashion. While Freund regularly entertains in style at her opulent bar, family is clearly central to her world: the curiosity cabinets are crammed with keepsakes including Lego models made by her son and the camera used by her grandfather in the war, while black and white pictures of her parents punctuate the shelves.
When we speak, she has just returned from a showcase with Tracey Emin and is laden with yet more tomes from the White Cube bookshop. "Books, reading, looking – this is how you explore art, unless you’ve got the artist in front of you and you’re going to exhibitions day in, day out," she says. "There’s so much to discover. Art is like a great journey, isn’t it?"
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