Step Inside the Drop-Dead Chic Paris Apartment of Fashion Designer Alexis Mabille
The couturier turns his creative talents to his own residence, mixing his furniture designs with prized vintage finds
After living for years in a 19th-century apartment in the ninth arrondissement, Paris fashion designer Alexis Mabille was ready for a change. He wanted something older and even more central, ideally a total redo that would allow him to fully express his craving for extravagance, embellishment, and in his own words, “almost too much.”
Long admired for the impeccably crafted, red-carpet-ready, and always chic couture collections he creates for his namesake label, Mabille has also established himself as a creative force in interior design. In 2018, he founded Beau Bow (a reference to his fetish for bows), a studio dedicated to designing furnishings and interiors projects, such as the Caviar Kaspia restaurants in Paris and Los Angeles. To date, he has launched two furniture collections, ranging from whimsical tapestry-upholstered sofas to metal-studded tables, with another introduction scheduled for fall 2026.
When it came to his search for a new home, Mabille focused on an area in the second arrondissement known as the Sentier. “I had been a student around here, and I wanted to come back,” he explains. “It is one of the oldest historical areas in Paris.” A short walk to the Bourse de Commerce, the Palais-Royal, and the Place des Victoires, the vibrant neighborhood is full of little shops, restaurants, and cafés.
After visiting lots of listings, Mabille finally found what he was looking for: a total ruin. His real estate agent hesitated to show it to him, but as the designer recounts, “the second I saw this place, I fell in love with it. I said to myself, ‘This is chez moi.’”
Located in a late 17th-century building, on the piano nobile, the apartment is approximately 1,345 square feet, plus a little terrace. Despite its condition, the rooms were well proportioned, with 13-foot ceilings, which Mabille had long coveted.
Undaunted by all of the work needed, he set about redoing the floors and ceilings and reopening a second enfilade that had been closed at some point. The residence had three bedrooms, but Mabille reconfigured the layout to create a single, gracious suite with a large marble-lined bath. He also devised a cozy, narrow library in the entrance area where he can completely close himself off to sit and read and dream.
In addition to installing period-appropriate oak parquet de Versailles flooring and antique-style mantelpieces to replace the lost originals, Mabille updated and added plaster details, enriching the living room ceiling with a symmetrical pattern of star forms. The idea was inspired by a room he had seen in the Royal Palace in Stockholm. “Not really 17th century,” he notes, “but I wanted stars on the ceiling.”
Channeling a Versailles spirit, Mabille made lavish use of mirror, most conspicuously in the living room, where it covers the entire wall around the fireplace, amplifying the light and creating a sense of expansiveness. Adding to the ancien régime theme, the room’s luxurious gold toile curtains feature an intricate brocade of roses and lilacs that Tassinari & Chatel realized for the queen’s bedroom at the palace. The floral curtains in the designer’s bedroom are an equally flamboyant embroidered velvet. “A little over the top, but I love it,” he says.
Basically, everything was newly acquired for this space, with flea market finds interspersed with pieces from his first two collections of furniture. In the dining room, antique chairs and rocaille sconces and candleholders mix with Beau Bow bronze-studded cherrywood consoles and contemporary artworks by Michel Jocaille and James Brown. At the room’s center, Mabille hung a 17th-century-style antique chandelier above a sunburst marquetry table in cherry red of his own design.
The designer’s passion for color is also evident in the kitchen, with its eye-catching green quartzite countertops complemented by a hazy woodland mural hand-painted in soft verdant hues that wraps around the space. Then there are the living room’s puffy 1980s lounge chairs, as striking as they are inviting, covered in scarlet mohair velvet.
Mabille loves to entertain, and he often hosts small dinners on his terrace, where he planted roses and jasmine. When it’s just him, he enjoys sitting in bed—beneath a photo of the Casa Malaparte in Capri, Italy, shot by his close friend François Halard—looking out onto the greenery and pretending it is a large garden in the country.
His aim for the apartment, as with all of the interiors he designs, was to create an emotional feeling. Reflecting on his surroundings, he adds, “I did it. I am home.”
A version of this article first appeared in print in our 2025 Winter issue under the headline “Retro Chic.” Subscribe to the magazine.