Johnny Sandelson would like to talk art over lunch with Picasso, Warhol

Chairman of luxury retailer, Thomas Goode & Co., Johnny Sandelson on his eclectic design aesthetic and why he believes art is everywhere.

Essential pieces
“There’s a sofa which I had designed so I can lie down and have a little snooze in the afternoon or reflect. One of my other favourite possessions is a china tea set. At 4 o’clock in the afternoon or when I get home at 6 pm, I pull out the entire set and have a cup of tea.”

My private space is…

“An armchair at the edge of my living room overlooking Westbourne Road. I can read, it’s close enough to a plug to be able to get power for my phone and I can look both at the passers-by in the shops outside and the pictures of my family and art in the living room. The armchair was designed in the 1950s on the West Coast — not by a famous designer — but it’s very comfortable. Sometimes you find a place that you feel so comfortable in that you can just relax.”

Your aesthetic would be…
“It’s quite agnostic. Anything could take my fancy. About 20 years ago, I found myself buying a full-size puppet of Cornelius (from the 'Planet of the Apes') because I thought that was a great thing to have. I also have this beautiful 1930s electric-magnetic clock from a Swiss railway carriage in St Moritz, a beautiful little Picasso and an art-deco menorah from the 1920s in Poland, so very eclectic taste from all over the world. To me, art is everywhere. It’s not about value, but something which inspires you or sets off your aesthetic.”

Shifting energy
“It’s a communal space, but it can be very private when I’m on my own. So, I like the fact that it’s got that energy. It could be wide and boisterous like at Christmas time when there was a full house with 20 people and then a day later, it’s back to solitude.”

If you could invite anyone…
It’d be amazing to have lunch with Pablo Picasso or Andy Warhol or Jeff Koons — great artists who’ve understood the power of their work over a civilisation. I think it’d be great to discuss art and the connection to modernity through branding and marketing.”

A signpost for the den
“‘Hang up your coat’. Some people like to leave things everywhere and I don’t like that. I think you can sit comfortably and be relaxed, it doesn’t have to be messy.”

Slice of life
“Every year, I host an annual cricket match where I invite my kids, my family, friends and business partners to play and watch. I don’t like socialising so if I play cricket, it means I can be on the pitch and everyone else can be socialising. About three years ago, I had an artist commission a portrait of my family playing cricket. Today it sits on my wall and it gives me all my pleasures — I see my family and my hobbies and a beautiful piece of art on the wall.”