Annoushka Ducas’s Georgian Sussex home is full of treasures and effortless style
With pieces collected over many years, family heirlooms, and eclectic finds, the jewellery designer’s home is a real reflection of her style.
Jewellery designer and founder of Annoushka Jewellery, Annoushka Ducas has lived in this Georgian Sussex home for 27 years, but she says it was love at first sight.
“I do feel houses are kind of meant to be,” she says, “and we literally walked in the front door and I said to my husband, ‘I just know it’s our house’. I knew in every part of me that it was the right house. Having gone as far as the kitchen and talking to the lady that owns it, I found myself doing the washing up. It just felt like home.”
From this immediate connection, Annoushka says it has been an incredibly happy home. Over the years she has put her stamp on it. Her mother died when she was 23, and so she inherited a huge amount of art and furniture.
“It’s quite eclectic,” she explains, “there’s Russian art, furniture that my mother collected over the years. At first, we could afford to do absolutely nothing with the house, so it just had to evolve. I’m a real believer in not doing up a house as soon as you get into it. I like to live in a house before you understand how it works – where the sun is, how you live in it. So it’s evolved over a long time and it’s still evolving now.”
The first place they changed was the garden, aware that plants take time to mature and settle to give the full effect of any transformation. The walled garden that now houses the pool was previously a vegetable garden. “We’re really reaping the benefits now.”
The size of the house means that it is incredibly versatile, with different spaces to suit different occasions. It also allows its owners to play with different aesthetics. For example, the formal dining room, replete with rich purple chairs and many mirrors, is the perfect evening entertaining space.
However, Annoushka explains, it’s not ideal for the daytime, which is why they have a second dining space. “It looks out onto the garden and is really light. It’s very much a lunch time, summer room.”
One of her favourite spaces in the house is a wood-panelled snug, where a painting of her four children hangs. “It’s really cosy and has a lovely fire. We use that all the time in the winter.”
While in the summer, a New England-inspired sitting room with views of the garden is an ideal place to relax. “I’ve done it tongue and groove with white sofas. That room used to be a sort of laundry room, but we knocked various walls down and turned it into into a much bigger room. It’s a great place to read the papers and it’s just a good place to be.”
Art is important to Annoushka, and the home is full of incredible pieces, some inherited and others purchased.
“Each piece reminds me of different times. It’s like jewellery in that respect. Jewellery is all about memory, the storytelling around it. And I think that’s very true in a house and the objects in the house. I have this collection of little miniature glass animals, all sorts of funny things that were given to me as a child from Venice, and which I suspect were part of my inspiration for designing jewellery.”
There are also plenty of pieces picked up from her travels over the years, such as a rug bought on honeymoon.
“We also go to Greece every year and there’s a particular beach that has gorgeous stones, and I always bring one back. They sit on the edge of my bath. They’re objects that may not have any value, but they mean a lot to me, and they’re just that’s all about personality.
Photography: James Balston
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