Karl Lagerfeld in his Hôtel Pozzo di Borgo, in Paris.

The Pavillon de Voisins, in Louveciennes, France. Lagerfeld christened this neoclassical, mid-19th-century country house the “Villa Louveciennes.”

*Top,* a bronze mask by Alexandre Kéléty and a pair of vases by Jean Dunand in Lagerfeld’s apartment on Place Saint-Sulpice, in Paris; *above,* the designer in his apartment on Rue de l’Université, in Paris.

Early-20th-century German advertising posters in the Villa Louveciennes.

Lagerfeld in his bedroom in the Villa La Vigie, in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France.

Lagerfeld in Le Roccabella, his Gio Ponti–designed apartment in Monte Carlo.

Lagerfeld’s bedroom in his Place Saint-Sulpice apartment.

Lagerfeld’s bed was complemented by a stratified-leather headboard attributed to Eugène Printz.

Lagerfeld in his Rue de l’Université apartment in the early 1960s.

The sitting room at Villa Louvecienne, with padded-velvet furniture attributed to Bruno Paul.

Lagerfeld’s office in his Place Saint-Sulpice apartment, furnished with chairs by Boivinet.

Lagerfeld at work on Place Saint-Sulpice.

Chez Karl

A look inside the many homes of Karl Lagerfeld, from Paris to Rome, Biarritz to Lake Champlain

When picturing the late fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, one might recall the bearded look of his early days, or the three-piece suits he adopted in the 1980s, or perhaps the black sunglasses and white ponytail that became his signature in the new millennium. No stranger to the public eye, Lagerfeld’s changing image is easily traceable. “I don’t want to become attached,” he told Joan Juliet Buck, a former editor of Paris Vogue, “and I detach myself when it is time.” Lagerfeld sustained his need for transformation not just through fashion but with décor. The designer owned more than 10 homes during his life, located everywhere from France and Germany to Italy, Monaco, and the United States.

Each of Lagerfeld’s properties served as a canvas with which to explore a singular obsession. After buying an apartment or house, he would decorate it in one style or period down to the smallest detail, only to eventually sell it all and start again somewhere new. His homes included Parisian apartments on Rue de l’Université, Rue des Saints-Pères, and the Quai Voltaire, a hôtel particulier in Paris named Hôtel Pozzo di Borgo, an apartment in Monte Carlo, two in Rome, and houses in Biarritz and on Lake Champlain—to name a few. “Each of Karl’s apartments is a perfect and closed universe, but a sincere one,” said the French designer Andrée Putman, a friend who collaborated with Lagerfeld on several projects.