The traditional details of Dirand’s apartment are balanced with modern elements, particularly in the kitchen and the master bathroom, where he uses large slabs of heavily veined marble, a signature of his work. “I like to look for materials that express a lot of disorder,” he explains. In the kitchen, books, glasses, bottles and cooking utensils accumulate on the open shelf against his minimal impulse. While he doesn’t feel it necessary to hide all signs of real life, Dirand has developed a sleight of hand for those things he finds aesthetically unacceptable. A vent on the counter, for example, is painted faux marble to match the Paonazzetto slab. “I hated that this stainless-steel thing ruined the beauty of this stone,” he says with a grimace. Similarly the flat-screen television in the living room disappears into a cabinet at the touch of a button. Speakers, however, remain in plain sight. “I know all the tricks to hiding things, but sometimes it is better to show it in a nice way,” he says, pointing to two large Wilson Audios that look like robots. “Yes, you can hide them in the wall, but not if you care about how they sound,” he adds, raising the volume on the techno music to demonstrate.

The layout also provides floor-to-ceiling windows that allow light to flood into every single room of the apartment, a photographer’s dream. “I think in pictures, because of my father,” Dirand says. Every night after dinner, Jacques would look over film that had just come from the lab, selecting his favorite images and sharing them with his family. “Every day was a new place,” he says. Today, Dirand creates highly detailed renderings for his projects complete with furniture and installed art, tweaking the design until the picture is perfect.