Surreal spaces

Both items have been well-placed in Sabina and AD’s ‘new’ residence— a place they’ve lived in for four years but have not,until now,allowed to be photographed. It is a shame because this is just the kind of house that gave birth to interior magazines. Just as you step out of the building’s elevator,you are immediately transported to a fantasy island somewhere in between Marrakesh,the Med sea,Mumbai and Goa. The three-bedroom flat is anything but that. It’s a breathing collage of colour,concepts and quirks that prove Sabina’s qualification as an interior consultant. Since the apartment faces the sea,all the seating and bedroom spaces look outwards. Conventional ideas and architectural rules have been turned on their head. One room seamlessly flows into another,even though she has gigantic arched doors separating the two.

“I don’t like modern lines,” says the lady,walking us around,sharing the history of a sofa here,a door-frame there or a table somewhere else. “Steel and chrome make me want to scream.” The house has ample wood and old-India elements,modernised with a magpie’s eye. The guest room has five different prints in it in green,and its tiles are replicate of Mediterranean motifs. One bedroom is turned into Sabina’s studio,where a museum of Raja Ravi Varma lithographs rests on lust-red wallpaper. The bathroom adjoining this room has cats printed on half its tiles,and rose bouquets on the other half.

The dining room and kitchen are separated by a window,the stained-glass top of it belonged in a church,and the emerald window panes came from Mohammed Ali Road. The bedroom is divided into three units: a fake verandah,a cement bed that rises from the floor and a small banquette seating space. The house is far too sophisticated to be called kitsch.

Sabina says she’s already styled two homes of friends and is seriously looking at interior consulting professionally. She lives between Mumbai and Delhi,where her husband’s Olive restaurants flourish. “I have a phonebook full of interesting shops and suppliers from both cities,” she laughs.

Her latest inspiration? “The Falaknuma Palace. I can’t wait to do up a house with ideas from there.”