I was watching the movie “The Reader” last night and was struck by the beauty of the Ralph Fiennes character’s Berlin apartment. It had a modern simplicity that melded perfectly with the aging sophistication of the city. The production designer Brigitte Broch succeeded in making me forget that it was a set (probably in a Los Angeles studio) and I felt suddenly compelled to move to Berlin and find that apartment.
I was still thinking about it when I woke up this morning in my small hotel room. I thought about its high ceilings, 7’0 doors, and long clean white hallways. I quickly became obsessed with the idea of space and realized that I could probably never live comfortably in “The Reader” apartment because it seemed too big. I’ve always lived in small spaces. There was a short period in New York when I literally lived in a friend’s closet. My most recent apartment in the Lee Building was the biggest place I’ve ever had (still a modest 700 square feet) and I had difficulty approaching the space from a personal design perspective. It took me two years to start feeling like I was getting close to having it properly furnished.
As much as I love and admire the architect Hugh Newel Jacobson and his modern residential cathedrals I think I would find all that space off setting. I think I need to be grounded in a room and if there’s too much space I have a subtle agoraphobic reaction. I begin to feel like I’m floating and that can be distracting.
So for the moment I live in a hotel room and it's surprisingly comfortable. I really don't need much space.
I couldn't find a still of the Berlin apartment set but I did find a photo (My sister Juliet gets photo credit) of me when I was living in a storage area behind my friend's clothing store in the early 1990's--again not a very large area.
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