White Porcelain Wall-Mounted Washbasin with Brass Taps

This generously proportioned white porcelain washbasin has stood in Patricia's bathroom at Chanteduc, the Wells' farmhouse and cooking school near Vaison-la-Romaine, for as long as she can remember. Wall-mounted and supported by a single turned porcelain leg at the front, it has the confident, unhurried form of a piece made to last — the kind of fixture that once graced the bathrooms of good French houses and has never really gone out of style. The basin is deep and rounded, with a gently scalloped surround and a smooth, glossy glaze that has held its whiteness beautifully. Fitted with a pair of cross-handled brass taps — separate hot and cold, as was the custom — the hardware has aged to a warm, burnished gold that sits perfectly against the cool white porcelain. Patricia installed them herself and makes no apologies for their age. "We put them in — they're ancient!" she recalls with evident delight. "I love them. I love old sinks. I like the aesthetic of them." This washbasin would be equally at home in a renovated farmhouse bathroom, a pied-à-terre or a considered country retreat, paired with linen towels, a wooden-handled brush and a green glass tumbler, much as Patricia keeps it today.