Lena Dunham Finds
Her Happy Place
MY
with real estate. Not a casual perusing-homes-for-sale-in-the-Sunday-paper kind of obsessed. It’s more than even a “let’s sneak into this open house and pretend we’re interested in buying this Spanish Tudor” kind of obsession. This obsession borders on romantic. She’s never been content in a home for more than a few months before she starts fantasizing about the next one, searching and craving and driving everyone around her mad with her desire to level up.
I’ve often tried to understand what she’s after. It’s not the classic American desire for more (more space, more windows, more clout), and it’s not about how she looks to other people or what her neighborhood says about her place in the pecking order. That’s far too basic a reading of the situation, considering she’s , upsized, and resized in no particular order. She’s dragged our family with her, and the most major fights of my parents’ 44-year relationship have been on this topic (it’s a miracle that they survived the Williamsburg rental with the and faux Warhol wallpaper). Her hunger takes no prisoners (unless you count the guests who had to sleep in the room off the kitchen of our unwinterized ). I sometimes have trouble differentiating between the we’ve lived in and homes we’ve driven by when she took the long way just to get a peek.
MOTHER IS OBSESSED
After years of chasing (and mentally decorating) her dream space—and with a bevy of projects in the works, including the upcoming HBO series Industry—actress, director, producer, and podcast host Lena Dunham discovers home is where you make it.
Butterfield Bedding Matouk; Bobila Can Bed by CB2; On Dunham: Nightgown by Stella McCartney, Rings by Mindi Mond and The Gild Jewelry.
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My mother would be mad if this made us sound like we had a lot of money to hurl around (as artists, sometimes we did and sometimes we didn’t, like the year that Christmas was a tiny newspaper tree and Indian takeout from 6th Street) or made her sound like a covetous jerk. Because she isn’t just fantasizing; she has a gift. When she dreams of a home, it materializes—most recently in the form of an abandoned boarding school in Connecticut with an oversize barn and a history of fires that led to the installation of concrete floors and red brick walls. She wanted a place to work, to dream, to host bands of merry travelers and watch a collie sprint (she got it all, including a very moody and loquacious pup named Penny). She would probably argue that the mistakes (prefab ranch house 10 miles from the beach and 0 miles from a frat house; the billionaire’s third guesthouse right behind the Appalachian Trail where feral backpackers would wander through our yard) all led to this. Her perfect home has just enough Colonial (columns!) and just enough Jewish (central heat and air!) to keep her happy. She hunts on eBay for Danish wood candlestick holders and milky Murano glass, and the walls have art by everyone from Richard Prince to Matisse to me in third grade.
The chandelier and console in my entryway make the space feel like a cloud of smoke.
Left: Custom Mini Pillows by Hill House Home; Butterfield Bedding by Matouk. Middle: Dresser by Roar + Rabbit from West Elm; Zumi Mini Bag by Gucci; French 1960s Gold Ceramic Box by François LemboFrench, 1950s Opaline Glass Boxes and Italian 1950s Opaline Blue Decanter from The End of History; Pocket Shirley Bag by Staud; Art by Carroll Dunham and Terry Winters. Right: Cairo Hand and Bath Towels with Custom Monogram by Matouk.
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Console Table 04 from the Crystal Series by Saerom Yoon and Triedri Murano Chandelier by Venini from 1st Dibs; Reversible Vase by Atelier Buffile from
The Webster; Victorian Mother-of-Pearl Box from The End of History.
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My mother’s artwork is also focused on the home. Growing up in Long Island as a second-generation American Jew, she had a book called My Dream Home, a scrapbook with black-and-white line drawings of mid-century rooms that encouraged the reader to place swatches of fabric underneath clear panels so that they sprung to life with color and texture. It informed her series of Instant Decorator photos, and also informed all of my work, as well as my own home obsession.
I thought I’d escaped it. I thought I was content when I moved out at 26 (too old, I know, I know) and bought my first apartment: a prewar deal so good that other New Yorkers became angry when I told them (I got it off a dead guy who nobody liked! That’s the secret!). But life happened and I fell in love and whispered those terrifyingly vulnerable three words: “Let’s buy something.” And soon I was pounding the pavement looking for a place where we could build a future, consider children, and install that much fetishized Sottsass shelf. I wanted to live in another creaky decrepit-glam enclave, and I told the real-estate agent that my passion was moldings—all of them! Any of them!
Elston Rattan Credenza by Mermelada Estudio CB2; Art by Rob Pruitt
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My man was afraid of dust. So we bid on an apartment that hadn’t even been built yet, and I spent the year making obsessive scrapbooks just like my mother before me. I planned for wallpaper (my friend Payton Cosell Turner’s Flat Vernacular does the best, and I’ve had the same pattern in three bedrooms in three apartments) and bought Josef Frank pillows and Nancy’s Blushes Farrow & Ball paint for the bedroom. I had art by Rob Pruitt and Ellen Berkenblit ready to go (queer and female painters are my thing). I even had all my mother’s Melmac dishes in queasy pastels. He was on tour, so she and I set the kitchen up, stuffed the closets, and placed the tchotchkes on the mantel for the great unveiling.
Left: Curtains in Perdana Fabric by Nina Campbell from Osborne & Little; Custom Desk by Carroll Dunham and Greg Curry; Radius Planter by West Elm; Custom Chair by Cisco Home. Right: Art by Penelope Gazin and Lisa Yuskavage.
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And he hated it. He didn’t want to hate it. He tried not to hate it. But he didn’t like living among the insides of my mind. I thought I was giving him a gift, like the time I came home from summer camp and my mother had painted my walls four different chalky colors and installed a
poster, a candle shaped like a slice of honeydew melon, and an inflatable chair (all this for under $100 at Woolworth’s—RIP Woolworth’s). I wanted to give him the magic that she’d always given me by dreaming her maddening dreams. But he wanted a Restoration Hardware couch and a giant watch to hang on the wall. I felt sick every time I made a design concession or covered up pink with dove gray. Love can only survive so much. At night, I mapped out my dream space in my head: A massive bed with an ornate headboard. A pile of the vintage Harlequin novels that Jemima finds at flea markets. It doesn’t matter where the dog pees. The rooms don’t have to be big; I mostly curl into a ball.
This Ettore Sottsass mirror is everything to me. The neon pink light creates the best mood.
Jenny Lind Daybed by Crate & Kids; Ikat Pillow Cover by fourhandikat from Etsy; Vintage Painted Nightstands and Celadon Porcelain Lamps from 1st Dibs; Art by Joana Avillez, Ellen Birkenblit, and Hillary Knight.
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Ultrafragola Mirror by Ettore Sottsass from 1st Dibs; Scallop Table by CB2; Clemence Dining Chairs by Anthropologie; Kalahari Rug by Pierre Frey; Collina Basket by Gaetano Pesce; Reversible Vase by Atelier Buffile; Candleholder and Sculptural Vase both by Harvey Bouterse from The Webster.
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The last time I saw that apartment was when we agreed, with love, that someone had to go. “You can finally eat in the bed without anyone getting mad at you,” he said through tears. They say if you love something, let it return to its prewar with floral walls. But I didn’t return. Instead, I made a massive real-estate mistake, the kind that nightmares are made of. I bought something in a state of panic, feeling like if I didn’t put down roots soon I’d float away. I never even moved in, and magazines wrote about it when I sold it at a loss. I was real-estate shamed. “You really are my daughter,” my mother said.
I stayed on an inflatable mattress on Matt and Carl’s living room floor in a co-op built for garment workers on the Lower East side that now houses video artists and academics. I got to know Sheila, the woman at the gate who received packages. I slept in my father’s office between two filing cabinets and used a box of printer paper as my nightstand, letting Friday night on Sixth Avenue lull me to sleep. I spent a few ill-fated weeks in a hotel with the elderly three-legged Yorkie I was fostering and gained 12 pounds in room service while the dog snored in a pile of dirty laundry. Finally, when my father called me a grifter, enough was enough.
On Dunham: Shirtdress by Tibi.
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I hired interior designer Ariel Okin to do what my mother had done for me and what I tried to do for him: arrange the things I’ve accumulated in an inventive and loving way. Ariel did all that and more. The towels have my initials and the pillows bear embroidery of my cats. The books are color-coded. My Lisa Yuskavage and Penelope Gazin pieces are framed beside a photo of the best dog I ever knew.
The space isn’t big but it’s perfect for pacing, and every day I do laps through all the doors like I’m in a slapstick comedy from the 1930s, amusing myself. When the people on 8 tried to floor-shame me, I told them what I love about 2: If you’re an introvert and often homebound, by illness or sadness or both, it feels like the passersby on the street are right there with you. They are my built-in friends. Across from me is a luxurious brownstone, but I’m not sure how it’s decorated. I’ve stopped looking in other people’s windows. I’m my mother’s daughter, but I’m finally home.
I picked this place from a thumbnail picture. A rental on the second floor facing the street, directly across from where a group of liberal arts students smoke and shout. It was close enough to the art supply store, LifeThyme salad bar, and my therapist. (New Yorkers all have their own priorities, like my friend who just wanted to live in a place where he could go out in a bathrobe and not be judged.)
This apartment seemed appropriate for a long interstitial, an extended pause. I didn’t know about the beauty of the building, its eccentric internal culture, the storied residents. I have friends on floors 4, 5, 8, and 17. The maintenance guys are either twins or just brothers (I’m too busy trying to tell them apart to ask). So. Many. Funny. Dogs. When I come home in a gown and Ugg boots and collect my mail, the old man on a stool in the lobby just nods. I don’t think I can ever leave.
Photographer: Alberto Zanetti
Writer: Lena Dunham
Executive Creative Director: Kate Berry
Fashion Stylist: Chris Horan
Hair: Aaron Grenia
Makeup: Matin for Tracey Mattingly Agency
Videographer: Quinn Meyers
Executive Editor: Alex Redgrave
Design Director: Rachel Lasserre
Graphic Designer: Alison Yousefi
The face vase on my dresser is another special vintage piece found by my mother; the art at top is by my father, and below is an illustration by my godfather, Terry Winters, who drew my pet newt in the early ’90s.
Get the Look
Monogrammed bed linens and polished prints meet quirky curios and groovy accents.
Perdana Fabric
Osborne & Little
Alumnus and Cherry Oh Fabric
Dedar
Egg Collective
Isla Coffee Table
Kosta Boda
Open Minds Vase by Ulrica Hydman-Vallien
Matouk
Custom Butterfield Sham
Kristen Reichert
Night and Day
1stdibs
Lounge Chair
Farrow & Ball
Pink Ground Paint
Amazon
by
Cyrus Grace Dunham
West Elm
1stdibs
Italian Murano Chandelier
Pillows custom upholstered by Gregory Powell in Alumnus and Regimen Fabrics from Dedar; Curvo Sofa by CB2; Lounge Chairs by Fritz Hansen; Coffee Table by Sirmos; Murano Sommerso Glass Bowl by Cenedese,; Table Lamp 1st Dibs; Samoke Silk Ikat Rug ABC Home; Painting by Kristen Reichert.
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On Dunham: Redux Sweater by Marc Jacobs, Earrings by Lady Grey; Rings by The Gild Jewelry.
I fell in love with this piece called
by Kristen Reichert, and I knew it would have pride of place above my new sofa. It’s from the Red Truck Clubhouse gallery in New Orleans, one of my favorite spots to find work by interesting female painters. I’ve started showing my own watercolors there after befriending the owner and curator,
Gabriel Shaffer.
My mother’s artwork is also focused on the home. Growing up in Long Island as a second-generation American Jew, she had a book called My Dream Home, a scrapbook with black-and-white line drawings of mid-century rooms that encouraged the reader to place swatches of fabric underneath clear panels so that they sprung to life with color and texture. It informed her series of Instant Decorator photos, and also informed all of my work, as well as my own home obsession.
I thought I’d escaped it. I thought I was content when I moved out at 26 (too old, I know, I know) and bought my first apartment: a prewar deal so good that other New Yorkers became angry when I told them (I got it off a dead guy who nobody liked! That’s the secret!). But life happened and I fell in love and whispered those terrifyingly vulnerable three words: “Let’s buy something.” And soon I was pounding the pavement looking for a place where we could build a future, consider children, and install that much fetishized Sottsass shelf. I wanted to live in another creaky decrepit-glam enclave, and I told the real-estate agent that my passion was moldings—all of them! Any of them!
I got this Gilda poster on eBay after hunting around for something to commemorate her and had it framed by Mrs. Lim, the genius who runs A-Z Framing; my dear friend Rob Pruitt made the glitter toilet panda art as a thank-you gift; the vase was hand-thrown by my friend Carl Williamson, a very skilled ceramic hobbyist.
Pillows custom upholstered by Gregory Powell in Alumnus and Regimen Fabrics from Dedar; Curvo Sofa by CB2; Lounge Chairs by Fritz Hansen; Coffee Table by Sirmos; Murano Sommerso Glass Bowl by Cenedese; Table Lamp 1st Dibs; Samoke Silk Ikat Rug ABC Home; Painting by Kristen Reichert.
Credits +
I’ve often tried to understand what she’s after. It’s not the classic American desire for more (more space, more windows, more clout), and it’s not about how she looks to other people or what her neighborhood says about her place in the pecking order. That’s far too basic a reading of the situation, considering she’s , upsized, and resized in no particular order. She’s dragged our family with her, and the most major fights of my parents’ 44-year relationship have been on this topic (it’s a miracle that they survived the Williamsburg rental with the and faux Warhol wallpaper). Her hunger takes no prisoners (unless you count the guests who had to sleep in the room off the kitchen of our unwinterized ).
I sometimes have trouble differentiating between the we’ve lived in and homes we’ve driven by when she took the long way just to get a peek.
Credits +
My mother’s artwork is also focused on the home. Growing up in Long Island as a second-generation American Jew, she had a book called My Dream Home, a scrapbook with black-and-white line drawings of mid-century rooms that encouraged the reader to place swatches of fabric underneath clear panels so that they sprung to life with color and texture. It informed her series of Instant Decorator photos, and also informed all of my work, as well as my own home obsession.
Credits +
“I didn’t know about the beauty of the building, its eccentric internal culture, the storied residents.”
“When I come home in a gown and Ugg boots, the old man on a stool
in the lobby just nods. I don’t think
I can ever leave.”
The last time I saw that apartment was when we agreed, with love, that someone had to go. “You can finally eat in the bed without anyone getting mad at you,” he said through tears. They say if you love something, let it return to its prewar with floral walls. But I didn’t return. Instead, I made a massive real-estate mistake, the kind that nightmares are made of. I bought something in a state of panic, feeling like if I didn’t put down roots soon I’d float away. I never even moved in, and magazines wrote about it when I sold it at a loss. I was real-estate shamed. “You really are my daughter,” my mother said.
I stayed on an inflatable mattress on Matt and Carl’s living room floor in a co-op built for garment workers on the Lower East side that now houses video artists and academics. I got to know Sheila, the woman at the gate who received packages. I slept in my father’s office between two filing cabinets and used a box of printer paper as my nightstand, letting Friday night on Sixth Avenue lull me to sleep. I spent a few ill-fated weeks in a hotel with the elderly three-legged Yorkie I was fostering and gained 12 pounds in room service while the dog snored in a pile of dirty laundry. Finally, when my father called me a grifter, enough was enough.
attributed to Viggo Boesen manufactured by A.J. Iversen,
by
A Year Without a Name: A Memoir
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A Year without a Name: A Memoir by
Cyrus Grace Dunham
black
farmhouse
exteriors of the homes
downsized
lacquered kitchen
downsized
lacquered kitchen
black
farmhouse
exterior of the homes