Our own photographs of the house, set in motion — room by room, in the light of the day they were taken. No film crew came. See Maison Baieta
Absoluty Spirit
How our films are made
No film crew has ever set foot in our houses.
What you see are our own photographs — taken for us by a photographer, the same ones on this site — set in motion. Most of what you see is the house itself, room by room. Two films open on the town before they open a door: the headland, the ramparts, the shore. The rooms are real. The light is the light of that day. The proportions are the ones you will find when you open the door. What has been added is movement: a slow drift across a terrace, a shift of depth through a doorway. Nothing that was not already in the frame has been put there.
We chose this, and it is worth saying why.
A film crew stages. It moves a chair out of shot, waits three days for the right sky, lights a bedroom that has no such light at four in the afternoon. The result is beautiful, and it is not the house. We would rather show you a room as it is and let it breathe, than a room as it was arranged for one hour.
Short, and deliberately so
About a minute is enough to understand a house: how the rooms follow one another, where the light comes from, what the terrace looks onto. Past that, you are no longer learning — you are being sold something. The films stop where the useful part stops. Each one tells you its own length before you press play.
The words are placed by hand
Every title, every room name, every figure on screen is set as type and laid over the image. None of it is generated. The reason is prosaic: ask a machine to draw letters and they drift and reinvent themselves — a house called Baieta becomes Baietta by the third second. So the images move, and the words hold still.
What we will not do
We will not add a sunset that was not there, a sea that is not that colour, or a room that does not exist. If a house has a small kitchen, the film shows a small kitchen. You are going to open that door yourself in a few weeks, and we would rather you found the house larger than the film than the other way round.
The films
Our own photographs of the house, set in motion — the shore at first light, the terrace open onto the sea, and the stone vault below. No film crew came. See Maison Pantai
Our own photographs of the house, set in motion — the ramparts walk, the terrace above the sea, and the rooms behind them. No film crew came. See Maison Marina
Our own photographs of the house, set in motion — the walled town from across the water, the table on the roof, and the staircase that climbs to it. No film crew came. See Maison Regina
Our own photographs of the house, set in motion — the bay with snow still on the Alps, the balcony with nothing between it and the sea, and the rooms that share its light. No film crew came. See Maison VistaMar
Antibes first — the cape held out into the sea, the ramparts, the Nomade facing the water — then the roof terrace above the old town, and the rooms below it. Our own photographs, set in motion. No film crew came. See Maison Soleiha
Antibes first — the headland between its two towers, the waterfront where the town stops, the lane along the garden wall — then the courtyard behind its blue doors, and the garden at dusk. Our own photographs, set in motion. No film crew came. See Maison BenEstre
The houses themselves are described, room by room, on their own pages — and if you are hesitating between two of them, this page compares all seven.