St James
St James is a minimalist interior located in London, United Kingdom, designed by Two Muse Studios with styling by Olivia Gregory and florist Juliet Glaves. The project occupies an entire floor of a Georgian townhouse built between 1748 and 1751, a building with protected Grade II status that architect Matthew Brettingham the Elder designed for William Wentworth, the 2nd Earl of Strafford. Los Angeles-based designers Alexa Lameiras and Katelyn Pascavis approached this workspace not as corporate territory but as inhabited space, allowing the building’s 275-year history to inform a vocabulary that privileges domesticity over institutional decorum.
The 3,200-square-foot floor plan dissolves conventional office hierarchies through a sequence of rooms that function like a well-appointed residence. A reception area establishes the tone with a custom charred-oak and steel desk paired with a bespoke curved sofa in plaid wool and a vintage armchair reupholstered in nubuck suede. This assembly of materials and forms suggests a drawing room rather than a waiting area, a deliberate conflation that extends throughout the intervention. The adjacent lounge spans the building’s front facade, where floor-to-ceiling windows frame views of the square’s park. Four distinct zones organize this multi-functional room without fragmenting its spatial continuity – two seating areas with vintage and custom pieces, a lacquered sage green dining table, and a custom bar constructed from oak, marble, and aged brass calibrated to the room’s proportions.
Material selections respond directly to the Georgian architecture’s formality while introducing contemporary sensibilities through surface and finish. Three types of honed natural marble appear in the bar, powder room, and kitchen countertops, their restrained veining and matte surfaces contrasting with the polished brass elements left unlacquered to develop patina over time. Solid oak flooring and custom millwork anchor the spaces in warmth, while leather desk surfaces and library tables prioritize durability in work zones. The layering strategy incorporates natural fibers – suede, wool, alpaca, cotton, mohair – to build tactile complexity without visual excess.
The designers sourced all vintage furniture from European makers, a decision that aligns the interior vocabulary with its geographic and cultural context. Two fully mirrored cabinets pair with high-polished brass lamps, while a blackened steel countertop complements charred oak on the reception desk. These juxtapositions of reflective and absorptive surfaces, of industrial and organic finishes, create the tension that prevents the space from settling into period pastiche. A custom bank of six desks in the open-plan office demonstrates this principle through oak bodies with leather tops and hand-hewn edge carvings, each equipped with integrated power and height adjustments that accommodate contemporary work requirements within a craft-oriented aesthetic.