“We met at a party,” she recalls, “and were chatting away in English, teasing one another about our pasts. I said, ‘I have travelled the world and speak fluent French,’ and he shot back, ‘Sure, and I have a castle in Normandy.’ It was only months later, when we got engaged and I moved to France, that we found out we were both telling the truth.”
The castle in question, parts of which date back to the 13th century, is called Dur Ecu, or hard shield, and has been the ancestral home of the family of Chau’s husband, Philippe René-Bazin, since the late 1700s. Now the weekend and holiday retreat for the Paris-based pair, the property was, according to Chau, “stark, dark and utilitarian” when she first arrived. Many of the rooms had not been touched for a hundred years.
Better known for her hip hair accessories than a penchant for home furnishings, Chau set about warming up and personalising the space — room by ancient room. “I had to negotiate my terrain little by little,” Chau says. “There are still many sacred places, such as the great hall, that my husband won’t allow me to touch. He did agree to build me a workshop, though, which involved trying to get permission for two years, and then knocking through a metre-thick wall to create big windows. That’s love.”
Just like her accessory boutiques in Harvey Nichols and Selfridges — dressing-up boxes of feathers, corsages and Swarovski crystals that reduce the most sophisticated design junkies to playful mode — Chau’s interior style is defined by fiery colours and no-limits imagination. Unsurprisingly, for a woman who has studied everything from millinery at the London College of Fashion to glass- blowing in Venice and blacksmithing in Tennessee, artfully arranging a few scatter cushions simply isn’t enough. “I’m happiest with a blowtorch in my hands,” she says.
And so Chau’s additions include wrapping her wedding invitations around bulbs to make hanging chandeliers, covering worn sofas with natural linen that she found in the attic — “crisp, perfect treasure” — and papering a 1920s wardrobe with old family documents.
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Many details in the castle have a romantic quality, restoring fairy-tale magic to the space. The worktop in the kitchen, for example, is set with jewels — “pieces of glass found at a bus stop in Paris” — that sparkle by the light of crown-shaped copper wall lights, “inspired by the French children’s story Le Petit Prince”, and giant candelabras twisted with ivy. Wedding-veil material is hung at windows instead of curtains, and in the main bedroom, there is a deep-plum silk bedspread, a gift from a Cambodian princess (who else?) and a lamp made from rushes gathered in the woods behind the castle (where else?).
The entire space reflects Chau’s exquisite knack for breathing new life into the old. But are there any downsides to living in a castle in the 21st century? “Are you kidding? The cold, of course,” she says. “In the summer, it’s cool and lovely, but in the winter, we can’t even think about heating the whole place. (There were 14 bedrooms at the last count.) We have underfloor heating in a few places, and just have to dash from room to room wrapped in a giant shawl.”
And the negotiations with Philippe? “Ah, yes, my next project,” Chau muses. “I want a terrace, with a little hot tub where I can sip champagne and watch the shooting stars. I think it would be wonderful to just lie there and make a wish.” Even grown-up girls who live in castles still have dreams ...
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Cherry Chau accessories are available at Harvey Nichols (0870 873 3833) and Selfridges (0870 837 7377)
[Photographs by Ray Main accompany this article in the newsprint version of The Sunday Times Style magazine]