Constant redecorating is far from over

"This is the third version of this house," says Lars Narfeldt of the lakeside villa in Dubai that has been home for him, his wife Soraya and their family since 2004. "I'm constantly moving furniture, re-hanging pictures - it drives my wife crazy but changing things around is how I relax."
Narfeldt, whose company, Kollektion, imports high-quality contemporary design objects and wall coverings from Scandinavia, cheerfully admits that his passion for such things goes beyond work: "Whenever I travel, I'm in the design shops and auction houses. I bring things home, then of course have to rearrange the house to make a place for them."
But those constant tweaks (including the recent hanging of a dramatic new custom-printed wallpaper in the main living room - a product of Narfeldt's newest brand, Mr Perswall) are minor compared with some of the changes he has made.
"The pool was directly in front of the house and I thought we should move it," he laughs. "Then I realised that you don't just move a pool - it's a little more complicated than moving a sofa." But that didn't stop him and the pool is now set to one side of the house, making much better use of the outdoor space. It is lined with deep blue-green tiles, the fruit of another trip: "My wife and I were at Chiva Som in Thailand and loved the pool there, so we tracked down the company that had supplied their tiles and got the same."
Before the pool-moving episode came the garden facade of the house - another major job: "A covered terrace ran across the front of the living room; it was too narrow to use properly and had big pillars that blocked the view. It had to go." So the living room wall was extended outwards by more than a metre and the windows of all three rooms along this facade enlarged and given cream-coloured frames, to maximise the light and the connection with outdoors.
More recently, Narfeldt had the original kitchen replaced with a beautiful, sleek number in brushed aluminium, frosted glass and wenge-coloured wood - but here, his ebullience fades: "I hate this kitchen," he groans. "Yes, it looks great but the nightmare of getting the work done ... And there are so many details that I know are still wrong." Not that they are visible to anyone else.
So where does his eye for design come from? "Being Scandinavian, I think it's a passion from birth. We Swedes like our houses, like a certain style." That translates into a remarkable collection of original 20th-century design classics: a pair of Arne Jacobsen Egg chairs, a rare 2.5-metre Eero Saarinen Tulip dining table and a collection of matching chairs, and a 1962 Bruno Mathsson Jetson chair among them. The modernist pieces sit comfortably among African bronzes, tribal masks, antique maps, contemporary paintings and vintage Afghan carpets and wedding chests - all of which bear witness to the lives that he and Soraya have lived.
"I was in the Swedish foreign service, then the UN when we met in Sierra Leone - where she was born and raised; then we moved to Afghanistan." Together, the couple set up their first business there - a reconstruction services company that Soraya now runs.
Their move to Dubai "made the most sense" for the business - and at last gave them the chance to set up a real home. "With the foreign service and UN you have no home," Narfeldt says. "I spent 20 years sleeping in dodgy containers in the middle of nowhere. Soraya had lost almost everything in the Sierra Leone civil war. So we started again, building our collections from scratch. Once we were settled she said, 'Now why not do something you really like?' That's when I decided to turn my love of design into another business."
 
 
 
 
 

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