Sharon and her “baby” Daisy
Singer-actress Sharon Cuneta swiftly points out that the place is still a “work in progress.”
“It’s incomplete yet,” she says of her latest home, which is located in a posh condo building somewhere in Makati. “The walls in the kids’ rooms are not yet painted in their chosen colors and designs. The kitchen has no island yet. The master bedroom is not yet done—except for a few furniture pieces and light fixtures. And the paintings are not yet hung.”
Ah, the paintings.
Sharon, known as the country’s Megastar, owns quite an impressive art collection—which includes paintings by Filipino masters Juan Luna and Fernando Amorsolo.
Indeed, these masterpieces would be right at home in this new “Mega” residence—which actually consists of two condo units.
“One unit has four bedrooms; the other, three,” she relates.
Living room is done in Mega’s fave shades: lavender, blue, white. —Photos by Sharon Cuneta
She asked her eldest daughter KC Concepcion if she wanted her own room in the new place. Sharon recalls: “KC said: ‘No, thank you, Mama… but thanks so much for asking!’ She is still my baby even though she’s now an adult.”
Well, KC lives nearby, says Sharon, in another building in the same area.
Mega has always maintained that her big dream is for all her four children, even as grownups with their own families, to live in the same sprawling compound as her and her husband, Sen. Francis Pangilinan.
Sharon Cuneta with interior designer Anna Leah Hernandez
In decorating the new condo, Sharon has turned to young interior designer Anna Leah Hernandez, who also spruced up the celeb’s former condo unit, also in Makati. (Most of the furniture pieces in the new home came from that previous pad.)
“Now, that old place was to die for,” enthuses Sharon who reluctantly sold the unit last year.
Sharon recounts that she first came across Anna Leah’s name in a glossy magazine. “She worked on the home of [actress] Iza Calzado. Now, she also does stuff for my friend, Juday (Judy Ann Santos).”
Sharon instantly hit it off with Anna Leah. “She knows my tastes so well by now.”
When they first met for the décor of the old condo, Anna Leah was a tad “nervous.” But Sharon’s “warmth and genuine friendliness” won her over, says the designer who graduated from the University of Santo Tomas and now works in her family’s construction company.
Sharon showed her a magazine featuring a living room she adored, Anna Leah looks back. “I based my design on the feeling that the room gave her.”
Anna Leah explains that Sharon “gravitates toward French provincial, with a lived-in, almost rustic look. She likes a room to look, feel and smell clean.”
Owl lamp is from a local supplier.
Sharon’s preferred colors range from pastels to whites, with “a hint of the in-between shades of lavender and blue, like her favorite flower hydrangea, and gray.”
“Her color palette reminds me of a Claude Monet painting,” Anna Leah notes.
Sharon agrees: “I love pale Easter colors. Pastels, because I’m sweet!”
She just has one stern rule, though. “No fake flowers, please!”
Real fir tree is spruced up with cute toys and glitzy ornaments.
“They’re so tacky,” Mega gasps. “I prefer fresh flowers. We get from anywhere, really. Dangwa is a good source. It can be expensive to buy fresh flowers every day. Good thing, I often get flowers as gifts!”
Anna Leah describes her Mega client as someone “who knows what she wants and what she doesn’t.”
“She’s passionate in everything she does,” Anna Leah remarks. “What I love about her is her appreciation for the littlest things. She would notice the tiniest details.”
It’s all in the details.
Anna Leah got the owl lamps from a local supplier, Heima. Sharon’s third daughter, Miel, is crazy for the “M” lamps, which Anna Leah got from Papemelroti (“with a little spray paint DIY”), in her room.
The butterfly lamps, along with the kids’ beds (including youngest Miguel’s Millennium Falcon), are from Pottery Barn. The distressed lamp base, Anna Leah volunteers, was something she had picked up in an exporters’ overrun bin. “I just had someone convert it into a lampshade. It is now in Miel’s room.”
In sum, the home is very Mega. “Everything that’s in the house… that’s all hers. My job is simply to sort out what is in her mind,” Anna Leah shares.
Anna Leah sums up their collaboration as a “dream.”
“Interestingly, she brings out a different side of me. It’s as if I live in a magical, whimsical world whenever I design her space. It’s like the movie, ‘Something’s Gotta Give.’ She’s the white pebble in my glass of blacks,” Anna Leah says.
Now, Sharon is embarking on another design project for the second unit.
The 10-seater dining table hews to the lilac motif.
“I want it to combine the aesthetics of Joanna Gaines (of the HGTV show “Fixer Upper”) and my own style,” Sharon asserts.
Sharon confesses that, while she would gladly share the task of decorating this current home with her family, the other unit will be totally, exclusively hers, design-wise.
“It will be Sharon’s little playhouse,” Mega exclaims. “I want it to be playful but elegant.”
If she would be given carte blanche in decorating a “secret house,” it would “look like something out of a fairy tale”—specifically, a Disney production.
“I am such a kid at heart,” Sharon owns up. “If only I could paint murals of castles, with owls and unicorns and hot air balloons and Tinker Bell and Lilo, in the master bedroom.”
Of course, Belle of “Beauty and the Beast” is also part of the master plan.
Mega’s big dream is to build a massive library like the one owned by the Beast. To be fair, she has accumulated countless books through the years.
But then again, that’s another story.