My Favorite Airbnb: A Design Lover’s Dream Home in the South of France
Half an hour outside Marseille, this once sleepy fishing village has become a magnet for artsy types on the Med.
When I arrive in the blazing sunshine, the house is sleeping, its windows peacefully shuttered against the unrelenting July weather. They’re painted a delicate shade of butter yellow, and in their modesty are a perfect foil to the fun hiding behind them: a delightful ode to considering the consistency of design rules as optional.
Downstairs, behind the shutters, there are two identical bedrooms, but for their colors . One is pink and the other is ochre, with everything from sheets and sinks to towels and tiles obediently adhering to their respective palettes. Soft muslin linen and squashy feather bedding cover comfortable mattresses and each has its own shower tucked into an arched alcove. They’re the perfect argument for the eradication of the primary suite, a holiday is no time to be feeling aggrieved by the square footage of your companion’s quarters. There’s something that feels extremely luxurious about stepping out of the heat of the day into these cool, dark spaces and being able to rest under full, fluffed duvets despite the temperature outside, we sleep like babies.
On this holiday, we’re a gaggle of girls all looking for the three S’s: sun, sea, and the aforementioned sleep, and the apartment couldn’t be more perfect. We’re in the middle of the tiny village of Les Goudes on the outskirts of Marseille , a sort of utopia for those with jobs that hover somewhere on the creative spectrum (or for those with ambitions of such a title).
As with all gentrified periphery towns, it’s a place that’s inspired a clutch of bijou openings over the course of its rise to stardom. Where previously, I assume, you’d be hard-pressed to find an iced coffee, you can now source one from multiple shops with hand-painted signage and eclectic, vintage furniture outside. It’s most famous, perhaps, for being home to Tuba Club , an irresistibly ostentatious (and wildly expensive) restaurant on the rocks which moonlights as a laidback seaside spot. There are, of course, more traditional restaurants too that have profited from their proximity to the sea for years, offering Marseillais cuisine and sunset views across the boats bobbing merrily in the harbor, with the reflection of the crystal waters dancing across their bows. There is one place though which has the most unrelenting queues, and that’s right beside our front door: the gelateria.
Interestingly, in a recent study on the happiness of humans, satisfaction levels increased significantly in line with the proximity to an ice cream shop. (There was one participant in aforementioned study, it was me on this holiday.) I trotted next door for double scoops of the gelateria’s goods twice a day, coconut and chocolate, mini stracciatella, strawberry sorbet, and the results were conclusive. Nothing will put a skip in your step faster.
To balance out all the ice cream (if such constructs exist), we spend the few days by the sea star-fishing in the turquoise water, eating barbecued turbot and clams overlooking the Med, and stomping up and down hills in search of rocky coves to make our own. Impossibly chic French families sprawl under striped parasols and eat peaches while we slap on SPF 50 and imagine a blessed life where we too were born with olive skin.
It’s a recipe for salty, satisfying exhaustion. A kind of tiredness which leads us all to wanting to spend a lot of time in our cabana (that’s French for beach house, thank you).
Upstairs things are dialed up in the open-plan living space. It’s a clash of textures, neutral walls, pops of colors, fantastically wiggly ornaments, and a feature L-shaped sofa in pink and green candy stripes where there’s plenty of room for us all to sprawl. There’s clearly been no expense spared as we discover in a heated game of ‘guess the price’, where we Google image search items and gasp at their monetary value. But beyond indulging in a little satisfying shock factor, we are all in awe of the thought behind the design decisions . No stone has been left unturned in the pursuit of comfort. There’s a huge projector screen with all manner of bells and whistles, a top-of-the-range outdoor grill, and a built-in sound system that make it feel more like a hotel than an Airbnb.
Off of the lounge, the balcony offers views of cotton candy skies as we sit down to the ultimate girl dinner on our last night. With the scent of the fig trees blowing in, we enjoy salads, crisps, fresh bread, cheese, and charcuterie before tumbling into bed just a little bit heartbroken that our days here have run their course.
I’ve always maintained that repeat-visit holiday homes are a funny sort of construct. With a whole world to get acquainted with, why would you want to return to the same place year after year? One visit to Les Goudes and that has been turned on its head. This is happily somewhere I’d return to time after time, but only if I can have the pink bedroom, please.
