The Summer Edit: Finding Space in a Paris Apartment
In Paris, storage cannot merely be added; it has to be found. That distinction changes everything.
The same room that seduces us with its tall windows, elegant proportions and original mouldings may resist every obvious position for a wardrobe. These apartments belong to a time when possessions were fewer and storage came in the form of armoires, commodes and trunks. To place cupboards wherever they happen to fit may solve a practical problem, but it can just as easily diminish the architecture we wanted to preserve.
Living and designing in Paris has made me embrace a certain restraint. There is peace of mind in owning less, but better—in keeping the things we use, love and want to see around us. But restraint alone is not enough. I also love the underlying order of a home in which everything has a place. Not an order that feels rigid or overly arranged, but one that makes the room appear effortless and the simplest routines more pleasurable.
Summer is when these two desires naturally come together. The long French summer gives us something increasingly rare: time to look at home without urgency. Paris slows, the days feel more generous, and wardrobe doors usually opened in haste can remain open a little longer. It becomes easier to recognise what has not been worn, what deserves care and what we want to carry with us into the next season.
A summer edit is not simply an exercise in removing things. It reveals how a home needs to work. Once we are left with the pieces worth keeping, patterns begin to emerge: what should be within easy reach, what requires greater depth, what must hang at full length, what needs protection and what deserves to remain visible. This information is as important to the design of a closet as the dimensions of the room itself.
A custom closet should never begin with a standard sequence of rails, shelves and drawers. It should begin with the person who will use it: how they dress, what they collect, which rituals begin there and what would make those rituals more graceful. Only then can the interior be composed around the belongings rather than asking the belongings to conform to the cabinetry.
In a Paris apartment, this is particularly exacting. Storage must be created without interrupting the light, crowding the circulation or weakening the proportions of the room. It may be found within an alcove, integrated into panelling, extended across an otherwise unused wall or designed as a freestanding piece that feels more appropriate to the architecture than built-in cabinetry. The right solution is rarely the most obvious one.
The summer edit is therefore not the final act of tidying. It is the beginning of design. It creates the clarity required to make fewer, better decisions and to give every retained object a proper place.
The true luxury is not having room for everything. It is knowing what deserves room.
In Paris, finding space begins there.
About the Author
Lichelle Silvestry
Lichelle Silvestry is the founder and creative director of Lichelle Silvestry Interiors, an English-speaking interior design studio based in Paris. Known for creating timeless interiors with warmth, elegance, and a deep understanding of her clients’ lives, she blends Parisian refinement with modern comfort for a truly lived-in luxury.
