96 ELLE DECOR
lap pool at its center. “As soon as
you walk in the front door, you see
through to the pool and feel almost
obliged to go outside,” de Caumont
says. “There’s no reason to stay
inside a house like this.”
He wanted the interiors to look“old but maintained, as if everything
was there for generations.” The
faded tropical hues on the walls were achieved with chalk
paint, a traditional technique that prevents streak marks in
Vietnam’s persistent humidity. While the veranda’s vintage
floor tiles are original, other rooms have fanciful encaustic
tiles of de Caumont’s own design, from a vivid star pattern
to an artful red motif based on a 19th-century French
design. He scoured Vietnamese antiques shops for choice
finds, such as a guest room’s ornate gilded four-poster bed
and a seven-panel lacquered screen in the master bath, but
otherwise furnished the rooms with his own flamboyant
pieces. Meanwhile, de Caumont made almost every lamp in
the house by topping local market vases with silk shades.
Perhaps the most striking design element is overhead:“
Color
reveals who you
really are.
”
BRUNO DE CAUMONTIn the children’s room, the
custom beds are uphol-
stered in a vintage fabric
from Spain and dressed
with linens and pillows by
Catherine Denoual Maison.
The antique desk is Viet-
namese, and the floor tiles
are from Caumont’s
Caumintiles collection.a ceiling crafted in white oak to
resemble the hull of a ship, from
which a dozen fans stir the air. Like
all of the home’s woodwork, it is lac-
quered black—a surface treatment
that, by the way, repels termites and
other damaging insects, which is
why it has been used for centuries
throughout Southeast Asia.
Since the completion of the house in 2016, high-rise apart-
ment buildings have been sprouting up in Ho Chi Minh City
and the surrounding countryside as quickly as weeds; they
tout such luxuries as marble flooring, crystal chandeliers,
and ice-cold air-conditioning to eradicate the tropical heat.
By contrast, de Caumont aspires to a simpler aesthetic, one
in which, he says, “you understand perfectly where you are
living—it feels good, and you don’t need more.”
He continues: “My mother, when she used to cut my hair,
would say, ‘You need to suffer to be beautiful.’ In the same
way, I believe if you want to live in a truly beautiful house,
you have to suffer a little. I educate my clients to live in this
kind of beauty.” ◾