A Room of One’s Own: how an unassuming apartment landing became a creative hub for the two founders of Moro Dabron

A sense of the past permeates much of what Moro Dabron creates. At the end of 2020, following four years of careful preparation, the brand released a set of candles that take their cues from the elegant sculptural vessels designed by 20th-century florist Constance Spry for The Fulham Pottery. Accompanying the candles was a range of heady perfumes with evocative names such as ‘Of Gardens’ – a nod to an essay of the same title that was published by Francis Bacon in 1625. Meanwhile on the Moro Dabron Instagram account, which has attracted a dedicated following of aesthetes, there are inspirational snapshots of everything from 1950s Parisian flower shops to time-worn terracotta jars that date back to the 3rd century BC.

It should come as no surprise, then, that the brand’s co-founder, Austin Moro, has paid homage to the past in every nook and cranny of his split-level apartment in Pimlico – including on the striking third floor landing, which has been draped in stripey blue ticking fabric in honour of “old-school English decor”. While for many, a landing is simply a means to reach other rooms in the home, for Austin it’s a space where he and fellow founder, Eliza Dabron, can regularly convene on weekends to muse on ideas, test products, or pour over their extensive range of reference books. Below, the pair elaborate further on the ways in which they use the landing and how it has come to contain a harmonious mix of their belongings.

“It is an incredibly humble, inexpensive fabric… I’m not drawn to it for its grandiosity.”

Austin: “The apartment is a rental so there were certain limitations when it came to designing a creative space; I had to work within the rules of the landlord. When we first moved in, the landing was so poorly used, it was just considered as thoroughfare. There was a ghastly big sofa that no one ever used, which was damaged from years of neglect. There were also awful curtains over the window – those were the first things to be taken down.

“Happily, I found a way that I could add ticking to the walls without causing damage; it is an incredibly humble, inexpensive fabric that is used for making mattresses and things like that – I’m not drawn to it for its grandiosity. One of my best friends who also lives here is a decorator, and I’m a product designer for Beata Heuman, so we both just love the idea of old-school English decor and the English country home. You’d be surprised; in a lot of austere Georgian homes, there is actually quite a lot of decoration and a sense that one should have pride in their home.

“I changed the central pendant light to this little Scottish Arts and Crafts lantern, which is quite sweet. I also added a table and some books, which are so integral to our creative process.”

“It’s a place for us to just sit, read, and think about where we’re going to take the brand.”

Eliza: “Our large collection of old books that we sit and pour through have informed everything from Moro Dabron’s scents, to the stories behind them and their names.

“Sometimes we’ll go to my place in Chiswick, and we’ll visit Chiswick House and its gardens, but most weekends we’re here at Austin’s apartment coming up with ideas or testing and trialing the candles to see how their scent fills an interior.”

Austin: “It’s a place for us to just sit, read, and think about where we’re going to take the brand. We’ll often go for strolls down the Embankment to the Chelsea Physic Garden and see all of the greenery. Living in an area that feels well connected is the perfect place for our ideas to incubate.

“What we also love about the landing is that it overlooks quite a large terrace. In spring, this inspires our process as well because so many of our scents and candles are inspired by gardens.”

“Constance Spry is someone that we definitely have an affinity with.”

Eliza: “The landing is home to a mixture of both our pieces, some of them are modern but most are from antique dealers.”

Austin: “I’ve added a lot of Georgian furniture, and Eliza has included a wonderful Faye Toogood chair as well. Another one of my favourite pieces that Eliza owns is a very good copy of a Charles Rennie Mackintosh chair. I think that the original chairs, which would cost north of £80,000, were made for tearooms in Scotland. I’ve actually seen one of the originals in the Vitra museum that’s just outside Basel. I was comparing it to Eliza’s and it’s almost identical.”

“I have a lot of lamps that are from the Pullman railways. They have these fantastic articulated joints that mean they can easily turn into wall lights when they’re not placed on tables. They were designed to be in spaces that are constantly shaking backwards and forwards.”

Eliza: “Austin also has a collection of pieces by Constance Spry for The Fulham Pottery, which heavily informed the design of our candle vessel.”

Austin: “The vases often considered to be by Constance Spry are not all designed by her, but she has become synonymous with a great deal of the work from that period. While Constance was iconic and a pioneer, she worked with a wonderful team of people. Whispers, over time, develop into different stories. But Constance as a person – or even as a queer icon, which is what we could probably call her today – is someone that we definitely have an affinity with. Particularly in terms of the florals that we use in our scents and in our penchant for English roses.

“It’s beautiful to live in an area that has a lot of history, but you have to accept that with time comes change.”

“The cornicing on the landing isn’t original, unfortunately, but that was another reason why we wanted to introduce the fabric – not to try and conceal anything, but to reinforce the feeling of an old country house. It’s beautiful to live in an area that has a lot of history, but you have to accept that with time comes change, and changes which often aren’t very economical to restore.

“I think what I love most about Pimlico is that it’s a central area and it has a lot of beautiful buildings, but there’s still a bit of grit to it. It’s where west London meets south London.

“I used to live closer to Tate Britain, in a Lutyens building that’s famous for looking like a chess board; it was social housing that was built in the Twenties. But with that came a lot of issues… for example, the heating was non-existent. But I loved the area, so I kind of just jumped over Vauxhall Bridge Road and now I live in Pimlico proper. It’s funny how you can develop an affinity for a particular place – I will probably live here for the rest of my life.”

Further reading

Moro Dabron

Moro Dabron on Instagram

The Pioneering Life of Constance Spry, London Flower School