Andrée Putman Studio Opens in New York City

French interior design master Andrée Putman passed away more than a decade ago — but her design studio and legacy continue to thrive.

On Thursday, her daughter Olivia Putman and Andrée Putman Studio chief executive officer Aurélie Laure announced the opening of the firm’s first New York City gallery, marking the culmination of a new era of growth for the studio.

Opened in May, the New York City location’s new address is 344 Bowery, above Par Excellence, a French collective dedicated to showcasing exceptional craftsmanship. It stands adjacent to Jean-Michel Basquiat’s former studio, a place long-woven into the Putman story. It was Olivia Putman who first introduced the young artist to Andrée Putman, who became one of his early supporters and advocated for him with Andy Warhol, the firm said.

Throughout her career, Andrée Putman maintained a long-standing and influential relationship with New York — marked by projects including the Morgans Hotel in 1984, the industry-forward boutique hotel founded by Studio 54’s Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager. She also worked on numerous private residences and the design of Yves Saint Laurent boutiques across the United States.

Envisaged as a real Parisian-inspired home, the studio is filled with vintage pieces, re-editions, and collector editions in an evolving composition. A selection of archival objects that have accompanied the studio throughout its history reflects the breadth of its collaborations across design, fashion, craftsmanship and luxury. Among them are the Ritual collection for Nespresso, the Pearls bottle for Chivas, the Veuve Clicquot box.

“It brings together the studio’s teams within an environment layered with memories, books, objects and ongoing projects, where contemporary work develops in quiet continuity with the past,” the firm said.

In February, Olivia Putman and Laure revealed the opening of La Galerie Andrée Putman in Paris and the debut of a furniture collection of re-editions, which is being sold on the Andrée Putman website. The new space was set within the same compound as the late creative’s design practice, which is located on 9 bis avenue de Saxe in Paris’ 7th arrondissement.

Putman’s aesthetic continues to reverberate worldwide, from fashion to hospitality. She’s remembered for her vision of the interiors of Air France’s Concorde, the office of France’s former Minister of Culture Jack Lang, several apartments for Lagerfeld and shop interiors for Barneys New York in Chelsea, Karl Lagerfeld, Azzedine Alaïa, Yves Saint Laurent and Guerlain and Le Bon Marché’s escalators.

Born in Paris on Dec. 23, 1925, she studied music at the city’s conservatory as a young girl. Her upbringing was conservative, and Putman rebelled early, sneaking off to the Café de Flore, where she fell under the spell of such luminaries as Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Antonin Artaud, Albert Camus, Juliette Greco and Alberto Giacometti.

At the dawn of her professional life, she worked as a journalist and later worked for a design consultancy. At Lagerfeld’s urging in the late ’60s, she shifted gears to interior design. In 1973, she teamed with Didier Grumbach, then president of France’s Chambre Syndicale, and founded Créateurs & Industriels to promote fashion and design. 

Putman opened her own agency, Ecart, in 1978, which continues today under the ownership of Pierre Yovanovitch, promoting early and midcentury design, reediting furniture from the likes of Frank, Gray, Robert Mallet-Stevens, Pierre Chareau and Mariano Fortuny.