GALLERY A haven for collectibles: Click through a tour of the apartment

December 8, 1999
Web posted at: 3:01 p.m. EST (2001 GMT)

NEW YORK (CNN) -- "If you're going to live with it, you have to love it," fashion designer Anna Sui says. But because she's a self-admitted obsessive collector, Sui says she made a new rule for herself when decorating her Greenwich Village apartment: "Everything that comes into my apartment, I have to use."

"I always had the tendency to save things," the designer explains. "My mother would always say, 'Oh save that for a special occasion. Save that for when you really need it. Save it for, I don't know, a rainy day.' Suddenly I had all these things saved that I never used."

Her latest addition to the living room -- paper mache furniture, with mother-of-pearl inlay -- follows those guidelines. What attracted her to it? "I think that the fact that it's black and that it has like this color in it and there's painting around it," Sui says. "It just doesn't seem real, and then the fact that it's functional too."

The living room features Chinese wallpaper. Sui says she was able to choose the color of the flowers, even which insects she wanted on which branch. The fireplace tiles, imprinted with mythical-looking creatures, reflect her affinity for the Arts and Crafts Movement of the early 20th century.

In the kitchen, an odd assortment of chairs illustrates Sui's knack for finding functional pieces at flea markets in New York and Paris. "Something that I always wanted was a real kitchen, and when I found that stove that made it even more interesting to have a real kitchen. And now I'm learning how to cook."

The red library is Sui's tribute to fashion maven Diana Vreeland, who served as editor for Harper's Bazaar (1939-1962) and Vogue (1963-1961). "My most precious collection is my bound Vogue magazines," Sui says, "and they're kind of like my Bible. I look at them all the time when I'm trying to inspire myself for a collection."

The master bedroom gets drama from its large-scale Victorian furniture and sophisticated mauve color scheme. "We tried about 20 mauves until we found the right shade," Sui says. "It could get kind of Pepto-Bismoly or too purpley."

But her favorite part of the bedroom is the walk-in closet. "I needed so much closet space, so much shoe space. Nobody believed it, but then they saw when I moved in -- I wasn't kidding around."

CNN Style Correspondent Elsa Klensch contributed to this report.

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