Right here in the Dos Mares area of Panama City, there is an oasis of good taste, color, art and the stimulating contrast between the city’s architecture and its seascape.

This is a generously proportioned apartment, laid out for the comfort and tranquility of its occupants. Although this home represents the best of interior design, it does not come across as being cold or inaccessible as is the case with other homes designed by experts rather than by the owner. Here, everywhere you look you can see the mark of the owners, their tastes, their personality, the unique stamp that identifies who they are.

The first thing that catches your attention is the layout of the rooms, open and expansive like an art gallery. This is not by chance, as the owners are art lovers and therefore decided to take advantage of the generously proportioned spaces to show off their paintings and sculptures, which can be enjoyed in their entire splendor from many different angles, including from the outside terrace.

So a walk through the apartment becomes an enchanted journey through the brushstrokes, colors and inspiration of the art works which blend naturally into the architecture. They quite simply complement each other.

In order to show off their art works to the best possible advantage, the apartment was decorated using monochromatic colors for the walls and floors, turning them into canvases against which the details of the decorations can be appreciated even more. However the apartment certainly does not feel monotonous. Despite the uniform color scheme, the visitor is constantly surprised by bursts of color, either a wall painted in a different tone – as is the case with the dining room which is dominated by an intense purple, or by a beautiful red chair of a distinctively contemporary style that we come across in the master bedroom, or in decorative details like the wine colored cushions on the sofa in the main sitting room.

Thus the apartment makes the best use of one of interior designs basic concepts – color. The second basic concept, light, is also used in a significant way in the various different areas. The apartment’s owner, who is also a graduate in design, commented: “Light and color constitute the perfect formula because the juxtaposition of these two factors can be used to create pleasing sensations even in the smallest or most suffocating spaces.”

Here such pleasing sensations abound, as the lighting throws into relief details which the human eye simply cannot ignore: paintings hanging on the walls of every room; the oriental style garden providing a link between the main living room and nature; and even the external terrace which provides a friendly and intimate atmosphere.

This terrace was in fact the reason why its current owners bought the apartment, with its views of the city in the foreground against the backdrop of the endless blue ocean. This combination satisfied their wish for a view that combined both elements, rather than one that only looked out over the ocean. After all, at night the ocean becomes simply a great dark stain on the landscape, and loses its charm. With the city’s lights the terrace always guarantees that there is something interesting to look at. And this isn’t only the case with the terrace as the property is well endowed with picture windows and each of them provides a magnificent view.

The style of decoration is really quite eclectic, bringing together pieces of furniture that the family has collected on their travels over the past fifteen years, reflecting both classical and contemporary styles. This collection contains real jewels such as furniture from Indonesia or the Chippendale style dining table from Jakarta. Whether antique or modern, the common theme of the furniture is wood, chosen for its nobility and the way it warms up any environment.