Who among us hasn’t spent a month, week, or even a day in Paris and dreamed of someday returning, keys in hand, to a Left Bank pied-à-terre? While such romantic notions may be nearly universal, few are lucky enough to actually realize them. Not so for designer Fawn Galli, who, after spending a year in the City of Lights as an au pair in her 20s, has just put the finishing touches on her dream Parisian apartment.
“Paris has always been so special to me,” gushes the New York–based designer. “When I lived there in my 20s, I always thought, I’m going to make it big one day and come back and buy a place in Paris. But when I eventually returned to the States, I forgot about it and moved on.” For Galli, moving on meant embarking on her now flourishing design career—first working for industry giants like Robert A.M. Stern and Peter Marino, and later establishing her own namesake firm, where she has cultivated a devoted following for her eclectic style and bold use of color.
After a few decades of hard work, that dream of Paris came creeping back. “My son left for college, and the dollar was strong, so I told myself: I’m finally going to do it—I’m going to go to Paris and buy an apartment,” Galli says. Initially, she envisioned a petite pied-à-terre. One bedroom—maybe two—in a central arrondissement like the 5th. But in a whirlwind weekend, during which she viewed four different flats in the span of a day, she found her dream home: a three-bedroom Haussmannian-style flat close to Saint-Germain-des-Prés.
Enamored with the intricately carved cornices, honey-colored herringbone parquet floors, and beautifully carved wooden boiserie, she kept as much of the original architecture as possible in her design. With the help of local architecture firm Atelier UNDO, she preserved and refreshed the original details, rearranged the layout to add an extra bedroom, and opened up the once-stuffy space to let the golden Parisian daylight flood in.
