Hiring That Surrealist Architect Was A Huge Mistake

Bigger On The Inside Than It Looked On The Outside And Still Absolutely No Storage

Margot was thrilled when her partner Lizzie suggested they try something a little more daring than the norm when building their dream home in Andalucia. They considered Modernist, Brutalist, Gothic Revivalist or maybe something in the Deco style. Surrounded by mounds of Architecture Digests and Haus magazines, they watched every episode of Grand Design in a week-long binge. Margot began to flinch at words like portico, buttress and cupola. She would rather face defenestration than discuss modular buildings or the joys of textured concrete.

Then a small blue card fell from a copy of Dezeen teetering on the ever-growing tower of books and magazines listing madly in the corner of their beige through lounge.

Salvatore Miro - Surrealist Architect, it read.  The logo of a melting bungalow on the back of a monkey left Lizzie intrigued. Margot was so sick of all the deciding that she just wanted to be done, so they’d called.

Salvatore was a charmer. His coiled moustaches quivered as he gave his impassioned pitch. Later, Margot would come to believe she’d been hypnotised by that vibrating facial hair. Frankly, it was the least ridiculous reason she could come up with for living in their maddening home.

It started to go wrong at the front door, which gave every impression it led directly into the stairwell of the adjoining block of flats. That was the issue with Surrealist architecture, they would insist on playing with perspective. Margot and Lizzie’s post ended up in any one of four other properties but almost never their own. It was impossible to get any furniture into the building - which meant they commissioned Salvatore to create their interior look as well as the building’s structure. Margot was already sick to the back teeth of the shower cubicle shaped like a duck and the rotary telephone that passed for a sofa. She’d butt-dialed her mother twice and the cat had called the police three times with its nose. 

There was an Escheresque arrangement to the staircase. Margot often lost several days just trying to take clean laundry upstairs. As for the kitchen, well, there wasn’t one. Just a giant apple. All their savings sunk into this monstrosity and Margot couldn’t even whip herself up a chocolate pudding to make her feel better.

She’d like to ask Lizzie about selling the place but she was no use whatsoever. As soon as the money had exchanged hands with Salvatore, Lizzie had turned into an inflatable whale. 

Unable to afford the mortgage on her income alone, Margot slowly nibbled the kitchen until only the core remained. Hungry and broke, she rattled around resenting the melting wall behind the bed and the fact Salvatore had refused to provide a single wardrobe because they were not ‘part of his vision’. 

It was while she lay ramrod stiff, unable to sleep, on the bed that resembled both doves and wine bottles but not in any way a bed  that Margot hatched a plan.

In the morning she flung open the guest bedroom, which was a battered brown leather suitcase. She began to cram the rest of the house inside. She squeezed, shoved and prodded. Slowly the property folded in on itself, pulled into the south facing guest suite with telescopic handle and retractable wheels.

Red faced with exertion, air blue with swearing, Margot got the lid shut and the entire property was contained in a single piece of luggage. She attached an address label and took it to the post office.

The surrealist’s playfulness with space and distance would be his undoing. Margot had sent the whole lot back to him and bought herself a tent. You knew where you were with a tent.