01-06-2015
A few weeks ago, our photographer Thomas Mayer and my wife Jeanine went to Mavaleix to photograph the interior there. Finally, it’s finished. At least, pretty much finished. The last key elements of the interior are now in place. In the main bedroom, we’ve created a Line Lamp installation in the dark rafters, and in the “Le Four” dining room, placed a steel Old Window Cabinet. And the Camenbert lids that Jeanine picked up off the street when we were one day too late to go to a bric-a-brac market, we’ve compiled a “Camenbert painting” from.
We’ve worked on the Mill for over ten years, with an interlude of a few years when we bought our place in Eindhoven. What, with the purchase and development of the property, these were very exciting and tense times. And yet, thanks to our experiences with the Mill, I’d learned how to handle processes which were way beyond my control, which was a huge help when it came to developing our own place. Ten years on, and there’s so much I’ve learned. The building process in Eindhoven was fodder for so many stories, I decided to write a book about them.
First and foremost, I learned: it isn’t that all of a sudden, you lose control. Rather, that you were crazy to even think you ever had any control in the first place. The reverse is in fact true. Better to accept that you aren’t in control of everything and save your energy for the chances and opportunities that present themselves to you; something I’ve been doing my whole life without even realising it.
Had we known in advance how long it would take before we had completed work on our holiday home in France; how much energy and effort it would involve, we probably would never have done it. But boy, are we happy to have it now. The book I’m writing about it will be all the sweeter for it.
Photography: Thomas Mayer / Mural painting: Jan van der Ploeg
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