Villa Bourgainville: A house to lift the spirits

The villa might have felt harmonious, but it didn’t necessarily look it. Successive interventions over the years had resulted in a space that was disjointed, “anarchic” and lacking soul. When Louise first viewed it, it had 13 exits – escape routes galore for the monks, she muses. For family life, perhaps not quite so necessary. “The house had the right mood and the ability to lift the spirits, so I knew I could make something beautiful out of it,” she says.

The task of uniting the original building with its disparate newer additions fell to Agnès Roca of interior design and architecture practice LUV Studio, who was briefed to “make everything more organic; to build on that sense of charm, which was a bit frayed at the edges”.

In many ways, the transformation took place from the outside in – apt because it was the setting that first caught Louise’s attention. “I always think how you feel when you arrive somewhere and what’s around you are as important as what’s beyond the threshold,” she muses. “What Agnès has done so well is to add Sabina wood pergolas that bring everything together.”

These pergolas are the conduit, she notes, not just between the old and newer parts of the villa, but between inside and out. The garden and its ancient fig trees – which Louise’s gardener has proclaimed as some of the best on the island, no less – were the clincher when it came to buy. “I was bowled over by it,” she admits. “It’s not huge, but it’s so immediate to the house. Every bedroom has a terrace, so everyone has a way to be outside.”

The landscaping, unsurprisingly, has been given considerable attention. Working alongside Eiviss Garden, Mediterranean wildflowers have been planted in abundance, bringing flashes of colour and interest in unexpected ways. “On the first-floor terrace, there’s a concealed flowerbed the whole way around – you can just see the stalks peeking up.”