Britain’s ‘Pie King’ Comes to Paris

21.03.2024 - 22:39 / nytimes.com / Art Deco

“They’re movable pieces of art,” says Budapest-born, London-based decorator Gergei Erdei of his new collection of hand-painted folding pinewood screens. Part of his Objects of Desires series, the six designs include trompe l’oeil columns, wing-footed mythological figures and interlinked geometric shapes. Erdei found inspiration for his pieces, which are over seven feet tall, in a recent retrospective of the Italian couturier Elsa Schiaparelli’s works at Paris’s Musée des Arts Décoratifs and in the lacquered screens of multimedia Art Deco creator Jean Dunand; Pompeii’s crumbling frescoes and ancient mosaics informed the mythological design’s soft, ocher hues, which were achieved through multiple coats of acrylic paint. “I keep coming back to Pompeii in my work,” Erdei says. “I find the layers faded by time so beautiful, like veils of history.”

Thought to have originated during China’s Han dynasty, screens became popular decorative pieces in Europe in the 17th century, when they were used for privacy and to divide rooms and block drafts. A couple of centuries later, Coco Chanel lined her Paris apartment with black-and-gold lacquer Coromandel screens. Erdei, who once worked as a women’s wear designer at Gucci in Rome, also wants his screens to stand out. “I see them used as a theatrical background behind a bed or a sofa, or either side of a fireplace,” he says. A bespoke screen will also make an appearance, alongside his signature acrylic murals, in his next project, the interior design of a private riad turned hotel called Le M, opening in Marrakech’s medina this summer.

English fare has rarely gotten its due in France, but the British chef Calum Franklin, nicknamed the “Pie King” from his years making artistically latticed savory pies at London’s Holborn Dining Room, is intent on changing that this month with the opening of Public House, his first project in Paris. Occupying what was previously an American bar-nightclub in the Opera district, the restaurant combines the brasserie format — broad and bustling dining rooms with deep booths — and the relaxed spirit of a British pub. Franklin wanted the menu to be an approachable mix featuring a selection of his signature pies (among them beef and bone marrow; Montgomery Cheddar, dauphinoise potato and caramelized onion; chicken and wild mushroom; and lobster for two) alongside pub classics like Scotch eggs, sausage rolls and sticky toffee pudding. “If we’re introducing Parisians to old-school British pies that are inspired by 600-year-old recipes and history, we have to do it gradually,” says Franklin. For the interiors, the architect and designer Laura Gonzalez wove in hand-finished oak furnishings, tartan fabrics that vary on each of the three floors and