Tour Rajiv Surendra's New York Apartment

I often find myself standing still in my apartment and just looking around; looking at my living room from the little hall outside my bedroom, or standing at the kitchen sink to view the entire perimeter of the small space. I realize that so much of my time in my apartment is spent thinking about seemingly mundane things, like what I need to stock the fridge with for making dinner, but also thinking about my past and my future, and setting up plans to achieve certain goals, small and large.

My mind needs space to think. I prefer total silence when I’m thinking, and in terms of my physical surroundings, I always feel like I can reach a conclusion faster if my eyes aren’t scanning the room and being met with clutter, a mess and tasks that need to be attended to. So over the nine years that I’ve lived in my apartment, it has become a stage that is set for some great or small activity to take place and then end. In those nine years, I’ve created my ideal home with what I consider the very basics: things that are useful, beautiful and made with care.

The living room is the largest room in the apartment and I spend most of my time in here. The walls, painted in Benjamin Moore’s Metropolitan, sit in calm contrast to the 1950s' lemon-yellow sofa (recently reupholstered). The sofa opens up into a pull-out bed for overnight visitors.

Fresh flowers change the mood of the room. I make arrangements with blooms that are in season whenever possible.

I found a lot of furniture and light fixtures for my apartment at flea markets, junk stores and even the curb on garbage day. This ottoman is from the Sunday Chelsea Flea Market and was $30. The sturdy fabric, an oversize wool tattersall, is in excellent condition.

I eat a lot of fresh fruit, but there’s such limited space in the kitchen to store it all. I arrange it in beautiful baskets, or on platters and cake stands, and put it in the living room. They end up being wonderful little displays of color.

I started learning to play the harp a couple of years ago. This Lyon and Healy Troubadour harp sits in the corner and brings a smile to my face regularly, even when I’m simply walking by it. There’s something magical about a harp.

Every now and then, a statue or a bust appears in a junk shop or antique mall and I know I have to bring it home. My method of figuring out where they should live involves just taking them around the whole apartment and trying them out on all the shelves, tables and windowsills.

The kitchen in my apartment is tiny, but I spent a large amount of the pandemic revamping it myself. I put up pine wainscoting and repainted the cupboards.

I added pine shelves (and painted them, too) to display my collection of ironstone and yellowware.

I chose a dark gray for the walls because I wanted them to serve as a perfect background for everyday objects. Each summer, I buy a California-grown garlic braid that lasts all year.

Because the kitchen is so small and cupboard space is at a minimum, I very vainly buy stuff I’m going to consume based on its packaging. If it’s going to be sitting around in the open, I want it to be beautiful to look at.

Small appliances that are used infrequently get put away so they’re out of sight. This vintage, painted tin breadbox houses my toaster. The antique yellowware dog bowl is for Prince, my neighbor’s dog who I occasionally take care of.

Onions need to breathe. I found this wonderful hanging wire basket in an antique mall in Louisville. When I go on a trip, my souvenirs are often practical things like this.

Garrow Kedigian, my friend who’s a fantastic interior designer, always says that every room needs one thing that sits oddly in the space but is, at the same time, harmonious with its surroundings. When I spotted this pineapple at a thrift shop in Brooklyn, I knew it would be the "weird thing" for the kitchen.

A crock for holding utensils is a very practical thing that also unifies a bunch of tools that are otherwise rattling around chaotically in a drawer.

Black Creek Pioneer Village was a historic site in Toronto where I worked as a teenager. Many of the buildings had peg rails, and I’ve been using them in my living spaces ever since.

When I redid my kitchen, I made a vow to myself that even the insides of the cupboards would be stunningly beautiful. I put all my pantry staples in old mason jars, other glass containers and vintage painted tinware.

I’ve been collecting solid silver cutlery since I was a teenager. All my forks, knives and spoons are Fiddle pattern silver from the late 18th and early 19th century, made in London. The more that silver is used, the less polishing it requires.

I make my own goat's milk soap, but every now and then I take a break and use a store-bought bar. Boxes like this one are so Old World and classically beautiful, they make me feel like I’m time-traveling through the simple act of using a bar of soap!

I made a flat panel out of cotton lace, tethered between two café-curtain rods, to cover half of my kitchen window. It offers privacy, lets in some natural light and serves as a wonderful backdrop for everything sitting on the windowsill.

My antique bed was made in Nova Scotia around 1830. I chose to leave the canopy uncovered — it feels more airy and sculptural. The coverlet on the bed was woven by hand for me by my good friend Deborah, who runs Upper Canada Weaving.

The bedroom is also my main workroom. My supplies and works-in-progress live both inside and outside the closet.

Another shaker peg rail holds antique gilded frames I’ll use for my paintings and other things that previously lived on the floor. The bedroom became a lot tidier with this recent addition.

Marie Kondo’s rule of only owning things that spark joy created a curated order for my possessions. Most of the things that survived the purge ended up being worthy of putting on display.

I have small antique mirrors in almost every room of my apartment, even in the kitchen. Because the tarnished silvered glass is reflective but obscured, these mirrors act similarly to windows, capturing light.

This is my favorite spot in my whole apartment: my work table in the corner of my bedroom. I spend hours here working by the natural light from both east- and south-facing windows.

I try to replace ubiquitous, modern utilitarian things with their older, more beautiful equivalents. This crocodile document folder, made in France in the ’20s or ’30s, perfectly fits my laptop.

My clothes closet is tiny, but Marie Kondo again had a major influence on its contents. I kept only the few things that I love, mostly suits and dress shirts. In the fall, winter and spring, I wear a three-piece tweed suit on even a normal day of running errands around the city. A man in a suit is never overdressed.

I’ve used chalkboard paint in two areas of the apartment that are small, plain and otherwise fairly boring. Architectural details drawn on in chalk completely transform the flat surfaces into something with feeling and character.

For my chalk designs, I use pattern books like this Empire Style Design and Ornaments, adapting various elements to custom-fit the space I’m drawing on.