Pieces of me: Susan Zelouf, furniture designer

Describe your style

My style is a sort-of pared-back luxury meets gothic glamour inspired by my experiences in life. I met Michael (Bell), my business partner and life partner, in Rome where I was singing jazz standards at the Café de Paris. I'd also just written a B horror film Curse II: The Bite.

He asked me to sing a happy ballad and I sang Gershwin's Embracable You. After that one weekend he asked me to move in with him and it was from the front room in that east Belfast townhouse that Zelouf and Bell started out. Back then we were making much more organic pieces including chairs constructed from wood foraged in the nearby forests. The Craft Council of Ireland expressed interest in a piece and that started us on our journey.

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Normandie cocktail cabinet in the home of Susan Zelouf

My style is influenced by travels, the time I spent living in Italy and by the trips made to Japan, originally to design furniture for the Embassy of Ireland’s residence in Toyoko. I now collect Japanese textiles and some of them influence our marquetry. I’m more inspired by jewellery, architecture and fashion than furniture. When we travel to Dublin Airport from our Co Laois workshop we pass two span bridges, one being the Boyne Valley bridge. It led us to design the Span table and that led to another bridge-inspired commission in San Francisco – the Golden Gate bridge.

Your favourite room

The open plan kitchen livingroom of our Kilmainham corner apartment cum studio has views towards Phoenix Park. In the background you can hear the trains chugging in and our of nearby Heuston Station. The sound of the rolling wheels calms me.

I often peer out the window. I find watching the traffic is meditative and banishes loneliness. There's a big chocolate brown leather Natuzzi couch that is comfortable enough to sleep on and a small dining table, captain's chair and folding leather and walnut stools, all pieces we designed. The stools lean against the wall when not in use. Dinner is usually something simple like roast chicken or steak and lots of salads. I still reference Alice Walter's Chez Panisse Café Cookbook, which is permanently open on a stand on the counter.

The apartment doesn’t have a television but there is a Bose sound system. In the corner is a Normandie bar cart set with an ice bucket and a bottle of champagne to help get any party started. There’s always a bottle of bubbly in the fridge too. On the wall is a tiny Doris Bloom painting of Skellig Michael. It is one of several Michael and I have that we traded with Noelle Campbell Sharp of Cill Rialaig. We gave her one of our walnut benches with a chain-sawn detail by Danish sculptor Jørn Rønnau for paintings by several artists who had residencies in her west Kerry retreat.

What items do you treasure?

There are several things that spring to mind. I have a white marble Chinese head, possibly a Buddha that is massively heavy so I wouldn’t be able to save it in a fire but I’d want to. I found it in a tiny eclectic shop in a village outside Turin.

A vintage Imperial typewriter called the Good Companion is for show only while a Yoruba ceremonial crown, from one of the peoples from Nigeria and festooned with a dozen white beaded birds, is one of the apartment’s key talking points.

I also love the pair of restored Hadrill and Horstmann counterpoise table lamps that I bought in Camden Market and a weeping girl hanky, still in its box, that was a gift from a collector client from artist Alice Maher's mid-career retrospective, Becoming.

Favourite designer?

I am completely smitten by fashion designer Alexander McQueen. I have a McQueen hummingbird dress, silk scarf and a never-worn pair of snub-toed black fabric pumps that I bought in designer consignment shop Ruby Ruby. They’re too high to teeter-totter around in so I’ve set them on the bedroom window sill on an antique tray I bought from Niall Mullen Antiques on Frances Street.

Artists you admire

I collect bronzes by Fermanagh-born sculptor Anthony Scott, love the work of Cork-based artist Martin Finnin, Mick Mulcahy, Siobhan McDonald, Christine Bowen and have a lovely little Richard Hearns Ballinskelligs stone wall.

Biggest interior turnoff

Clutter makes me anxious. I need to see surfaces, darling, surfaces.

Travel destination that stands out

I lived in Rome for five years and I’m mad about it, in spite of the chaos, corruption, and broken down infrastructure. I love wandering the streets which are still pretty individual and sitting in the cafes eating food that is in season.

€100,000 to spend what would you buy?

I would love a housekeeper to change the linens daily, a Duxiana bed, a black springbok throw and cushions made from culled animal skins, lighting by Niamh Barry, smart wiring, so I can control everything from bed and while I’m away, including brewing the coffee and the sound system. As well as that I’d love a gym, with a stern trainer and a soundtrack selected by Prince, a silk hummingbird rug by Alexander McQueen for the Rug Company, and, if there’s any change left, cash back, please.

Zelouf and Bell have been commissioned to do the interiors of Restaurant Patrick Guillbaud. They will be showing at Decorex in London in September and in October readers can see some of their Tattoo sideboards and Brick Conference table and chairs, inspired by the bas reliefs of Gabriel Hayes at the Department of Enterprise and Employment on Kildare Street as part of this year's Open House programme. Zeloufandbell.com