My world: Serafina Sama
FROM POP ART TO PLAYBOY, VIA MURANO AND MODERNISM, THE WEST LONDON HOME OF ISA ARFEN FOUNDER SERAFINA SAMA IS NOTHING IF NOT ECLECTIC
The Isa Arfen founder and designer takes us through her beautifully curated home and wardrobe
ISA ARFEN designer Serafina Sama’s sprawling west London house is not so much a home as a visual experience. Each colour and every piece (the velvet forestgreen bed, the canary-yellow sofas, the sumptuous family hand-me-downs from Italy) contribute to an overall mood.
It comes as no surprise when Serafina tells me she initially came to London to study architecture: ‘My parents were not into the idea of fashion – it was too frivolous and they wanted me to get a serious degree first, so we decided on architecture.’ Her Regency home reveals a curatorial eye and is filled with a mix of pieces she’s bought in her home town of Ravenna, Italy, and local neighborhoods in London.
Fate meant that the Architectural Association where Serafina studied was a stone’s throw from Central Saint Martins. And after walking past the entrance of one of the world’s most renowned fashion schools every day for two years, she decided to enroll in the Fashion BA. ‘I realised I would never want to be an architect – my heart was set on fashion,’ she says.
Following her graduation, stints at the big fashion houses ensued: Marc Jacobs, Marni, Lanvin and, finally, Chloé, where she stayed as a designer for two years. Work then slowed down as she shifted her focus to motherhood (she has a son, Ari), but the desire to create something never subsided.
So she designed a small line of summer dresses with a vaguely retro sense of glamour, which she sold by word of mouth to her friends and family. Her solo career was made a year later, when she showed her collection from small garment bags in the corridor of a London hotel to Kate Foley, then buyer for Opening Ceremony. Foley bought it on the spot.
Forty-five worldwide stockists later, Serafina is now a fixture on the London Fashion Week calendar, with an ever-growing following for her knotted off-the-shoulder dresses, even if her fans aren’t always clear on who Isa Arfen is. ‘A lot of people think there’s a person called Isa Arfen and that I’m her sister or assistant or something. Sometimes, people contact me and ask if I’m able to share her email address. And I reply saying there is no Isa, it’s just me!’
Serafina’s home reflects the same vintage wanderlust that first inspired her collection. Some of her favourite furniture and wardrobe pieces have a heightened sense of nostalgia. ‘My two aunts were very much into fashion, always quite eccentric, so from a young age they gave me this love of vintage that I am still very passionate about now,’ she says. And that passion is clearly – and beautifully – evident as Serafina shows us around her home.