Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé, François Pinault, Valentino Garavani, Ralph Lauren and Andrés Santo Domingo are some of Jacques Grange’s distinguished private clients, while his inimitable style can be enjoyed in public venues such as the Mark Hotel, New York, and Francis Ford Coppola’s Palazzo Marguerita in Italy. He has also added his aesthetic to fashion boutiques such as The Row in New York and more recently at Chanel’s haute couture salon at 31 rue Cambon, Paris, not far from his own home.

For Grange lives in the heart of Paris with breath-taking views over the spectacular gardens of the Palais-Royal. An 18th-century residence has been his home since 1990, though he has recently expanded and renovated it. Once home to the novelist Colette, its location and history encapsulates the essence of Parisian elegance. It also epitomises Grange’s inimitable and very personal approach to interior design.

In this art-filled apartment Grange effortlessly mixes the simple with the sophisticated, combining old-world luxury with contemporary art and design. Against pale walls tinted with only the slightest of hues, his mastery of colour is displayed by the carefully considered placement of a brilliant red console table by Hervé Van der Straeten, or a citron yellow painting by Carla Accardi surrounded by a pale blue canvas by Robert Motherwell. In the library/guestroom these same colours are revisited in a triptych by Christian Berard, one of the designer’s favourite 20th-century artists.

Photographs throughout by François Halard

The entire duplex is filled with tangible souvenirs of places, artists, and designers that have informed Grange’s creative universe, including Colette’s tufted chaise longue, African art and furniture, a delicate Viennese modernist cabinet, classical sculptures and bronzes, photographs of Marie-Laure de Noailles – the patron who first invited him into the exclusive salons of the Parisian art world – a set of 18th-century dining chairs covered in pale grey leather, a Géricault nude that once belonged to Pierre Bergé and Yves Saint Laurent, and a pair of 19th-century chairs from the collection of Madeleine Castaing.

The kitchen and small alcove, meanwhile, are decorated with antique azulejos, recalling his love of Portugal, and furniture by French Modernist masters such as Francis Jourdain, Jean Royère and Marc Newson.

Fine materials and craftsmanship also distinguish this storied residence: the master bathroom is clad seamlessly with burgundy and black-veined Palissandro marble. Occupying the middle of one of the apartment’s central salons is a gorgeously crafted sculptural spiral staircase in metal, designed by Grange and inspired by Le Corbusier, exploding the classical frame of the apartment’s architecture with a bold statement of pure drama.

From: Jacques Grange: Recent Work, Pierre Passebon, Flammarion 2021. @jacques.grange