I don’t know if the painter Claudio Bravo ever met singer-songwriter-musician Graham Nash, who wrote the late 1960s hit, “Marrakesh Express.” But it's Nash's song that chugs through my brain, like the train from Casablanca to Marrakech he sings of, every time I look at these photos of Bravo’s recently reimagined Marrakech riad.
More likely (though a far cry from fact), it was the reverse. The song, written in 1966 and released in 1969, could be what inspired Bravo to ditch the concrete jungle of New York City in 1972 for the splendors of the Mediterranean sun on Africa’s northern coast.
Bravo eventually owned three homes in Morocco, and this four-bedroom, single-story one in Marrakech became his winter abode. When the painter died in 2011, he bequeathed it and much of its contents to a friend. It's new caretaker called on Sardar Design Studio of New York to refresh the place as a getaway for her family while maintaining its stature as a museum home. The results are beyond stunning, as you will see.
Bravo was a hyperrealist painter, so I think he would’ve appreciated Nash leaving the first-class section of the train to mingle with the common folk and their animals, as the song describes. In fact, this 18th-century home is reached via twisting streets and alleyways, tucked amid merchant shops and artisan stalls. So it seems only fitting (to me anyway) for Nash’s lyrics to narrate our tour. If you’re a boho child of the late 1960s, like me, you surely remember the tune and can, at the very least, hum along.
All on board that train!
Simon Upton photo
A 19th-century-style bronze knocker and a plethora of nailheads greet you at the front door. Inside, a Syrian bridal chest and mirror inlaid with mother-of-pearl catch the sun from the courtyard around which the home is built.
Looking at the world through the sunset in your eyes
Simon Upton photo
A Berber blanket hangs above the living room sofa, a brazier (foreground left) doubles as a side table, and a banquet dish and stand serve as coffee table.
Trying to make the train through clear Moroccan skies
Simon Upton photo
At the other end of the living room, a Kurdish kilim covers a table. The daybed and star-shaped side table are Syrian, while the rugs are Moroccan.
Ducks and pigs and chickens call Animal carpet wall to wall
American ladies five foot tall in blue
Simon Upton photo
The dining room light fixture is an antique mosque lamp, an Uzbek suzani serves as tablecloth, and the chairs are camel-bone veneer.
Sweeping cobwebs from the edges of my mind
Simon Upton photo
The richly inlaid furniture in this cozy corner of Bravo’s former studio is also Syrian. The Andalusian-style plaster frieze is custom-made. Most of Bravo’s art went to family members when he died, but the lithographs displayed here came with the house.
Had to get away to see what we could find
Simon Upton photo
A Spanish colonial desk, 19th-century Moroccan globes and box, a collection of antique Mamluk mosque lamps, Émile Gallé vases, and more Syrian pieces decorate the study.
Hope the days that lie ahead
Simon Upton photo
In Bravo’s former bedroom, the headboard is draped with a wool blanket and the bed with a Berber wedding blanket. The chest is antique Moroccan, and the Tuareg carpet is made of woven leather and palm fronds.
Bring us back to where they've led
Simon Upton photo
The Green Bedroom is my favorite room in the house. The bedspread is Gujarati mirrorwork embroidery, the chest is 19th-century Moroccan, and the desk and chair are bone inlay.
Listen not to what's been said to you
Simon Upton photo
In another bedroom, embroidered pillows from Fez and Rabat gather on an antique Spanish bed. The chair is Indian, while the table and chest of drawers are Syrian.
Would you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express?
Would you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express?
All on board that train!
Simon Upton photo
And yes, the house comes with its own hammam—in Valencian marble, no less.
I've been saving all my money just to take you there
Simon Upton photo
I could do for a soak here, especially after that dusty train ride.
I smell the garden in your hair
Simon Upton photo
Or here. I’m not particular, but I am wondering about the view from these tubs.
Take the train from Casablanca going south
Simon Upton photo
I hear it’s spectacular, so let’s take a closer look.
Blowing smoke rings from
the corners of my my, my my, my mouth
Simon Upton photo
Mandarin-orange trees underplanted with white roses grace the courtyard. Part of the “refresh” involved deepening the courtyard pool, which features a 19th-century Indian fountain, to allow for swimming. Street sounds drift over the courtyard walls, as do the Islamic calls to prayer.
Colored cottons hang in air
Charming cobras in the square
Striped djellebas we can wear at home
Simon Upton photo
This patio furniture is Indian marble, while the lantern is Moroccan. What else?
Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express? Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express? They're taking me to Marrakesh. All on board that train! All on board that train!
If you want more, which, of course, you KNOW you do…
Self-portrait of Claudio Bravo painting in his djellaba
Check out decorative art from the homes and studio of Claudio Bravo from a past auction HERE and HERE.
Click on the play button in the video below to watch and listen as a mature Crosby, Stills & Nash perform “Marrakesh Express.” Then, as it plays, go back and look through this home again. You can even sing along!
If touring this home gives you a hankering for Morocco, you're in luck! Bravo's main home—a palace in Tangiers—is for sale. Follow the link to the realtor's listing. His third home at Taroudant is a museum you can tour when you visit and, in the meantime, virtually. You'll find additional photographs of it on Trip Advisor.
Check out the (affiliate) links at the bottom of this page to learn more about the group Crosby, Stills & Nash; the painter, Claudio Bravo; and how to get the Moroccan look in your boho home.
Shop (and follow!) both my Etsy and ebay stores for vintage finds, a few of my boho DIYs, and next-to-new surplus home decor. New merchandise gets added daily, so check both places often.
Sign up to have BoHo Home posts sent to your inbox using the subscription link in the sidebar (top right). Or follow with Bloglovin, a social-media platform that allows you to set up an account and access all the blogs you want to read in one place.
This 1,475-square-foot apartment on Moscow’s Lomonosov Avenue may not come complete with James Bond (Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan, or even Daniel Craig). But like the classic spy thriller series and its stars, it’s bold, glamorous, and indefatigably charming.
It’s the home of interior designer Marina Zhukova, who put her own personal stamp on the luxe digs in a new build so her young family could be closer to their textile and wallpaper showroom in the nearby Frunzenskaya Embankment.
Have a look around & see if you don’t agree: It’s both Bond-tastic AND Spectre-acular!
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If you want more…
Continue your tour of this apartment at The Village. And don’t leave the site without opposite-mouse-clicking on “translate” to read the article by Masha Shatalina.
Shop (and follow!) both my Etsy and ebay stores for vintage finds, a few of my boho DIYs, and next-to-new surplus home decor. New merchandise gets added daily, so check both places often.
Sign up to have BoHo Home posts sent to your inbox using the subscription link in the sidebar (top right). Or follow with Bloglovin, a social-media platform that allows you to set up an account and access all the blogs you want to read in one place.
I’m going out on a limb here and recommending that EVERY desk should be parked under a window. Rather than a distraction, the view to the world outside helps feed your creativity.
Ideal Home
When I see a desk under a window I think of this passage from a favorite book, Brenda Ueland’s If You Want to Write:
So you see, the imagination needs moodling—long, inefficient, happy idling, dawdling and puttering…the dreamy idleness that children have, an idleness when you walk alone for a long, long time, or take a long, dreamy time at dressing, or lie in bed at night and thoughts come and go, or dig in a garden, or drive in a car for many hours alone, or play the piano, or sew, or paint ALONE, or an idleness—and this is what I want you to do—where you sit with pencil and paper or before a typewriter quietly putting down what you happen to be thinking.
Felipe Scheffel photo
Or an idleness where you sit at your desk, pause in your work, and simply gaze out at whatever happens to be there. You will eventually start to notice things beyond when your neighbors come and go, though that can be a story in itself.
David Merewether photo / Wealden Times
Here are just a few of the amazing things I’ve witnessed gazing out the window over my desk:
The couple across the street arguing—I could see the red in her face as she got in the car, slammed the door and screeched the tires down the street while the husband stood, bewildered in the driveway.
The underbelly of a preying mantis as it hung from my screen.
The removal of a tree from my neighbor’s yard, section by section, like dismantling a life.
A squirrel digging up food he remembered burying in a very specific place in my yard.
The habits of birds at the feeder—nuthatches walking down the tree, woodpeckers digging out bugs, finches gossiping, cardinals picking out the safflower seeds.
A hawk approaching, the birds hiding in a bush, the hawk diving into the bush—mayhem!
A stealthy squirrel outwitting another predatory hawk.
A tiny turtle crossing my sidewalk and disappearing into my flowerbed
A frightened raccoon in a storm, taking shelter in my bushes.
A female cardinal who bloodied her beak, determined to scare off the interloper she perceived in the window reflection.
A deer resting under my plum tree, then loping off down the middle of my suburban street.
Via Barney Frank
More from Ueland:
I tell you and reassure you: at such times you are being slowly filled and re-charged with warm imagination, with wonderful, living thoughts…What you write today is the result of some span of idling yesterday, some fairly long period of protection from talking and busyness.
GR-Bolig
Inspiration does not come like a bolt, nor is it kinetic, energetic striving, but it comes into us slowly and quietly and all the time, though we must regularly and every day give it a little chance to start flowing, prime it with a little solitude and idleness.
Paul Costello photo
I learned that you should feel, when writing, not like Lord Byron on a mountaintop, but like a child stringing beads in kindergarten—happy, absorbed, and quietly putting one bead on after another.
Via Anna Gillar
This may be the setting I find ideal...
Nicole LaMotte photo
...windows with views to AT LEAST two planes.
Via Habitually Chic
And remember, that means UP, too. One of the nicest days in memory was spent in a friend’s work area on an enclosed solarium porch with a view to the sky above. We may not all be that lucky…
Via Mad About the House
…but even brick walls have secrets to reveal.
Manuel Rodriguez photo
So the next time you position a desk, go for right under the window.
Design Dump
It doesn’t matter if the space you have is a little…
The Everygirl
…or a lot.
Ultralinx
The window is where you want to work.
And moodle, of course.
Build in, if you prefer.
Via Desk Layout Ideas
Even add shelves.
Via Beautiful Things That Make Me Happy
Just keep the desk under the window.
It’s okay to share the view, too…
…as long as it doesn't interfere with individual moodling.
Hudson Valley Lighting
You won’t be sorry.
If you want more (& you should because there’s always more that wants YOU)…
Check out the (affiliate) links below to get books by Brenda Ueland and books on the power of solitude, imagination and daydreaming.
Shop (and follow!) my Etsy store, BoHo Home By Susan, for vintage finds and a few of my boho DIYs. I have vintage and home décor items for sale on ebay too! New merchandise gets added daily, so check both places often.
Sign up to have BoHo Home posts sent to your inbox using the subscription link in the sidebar (top right). Or follow with Bloglovin, a social-media platform that allows you to set up an account and access all the blogs you want to read in one place.
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