Penny & Philippe Michel live with their two sons and a “adopted” daughter in a white, stucco house. The house, and the ones on either side of it, are unusual for Chicago. They were built to demonstrate this then-unfamiliar style of home building around the time of the 1933 World’s Fair.
Penny is a ceramic artist. She works in a studio away from home three days a week. She makes large, colorful bowls and platters, pieces that have a brightness which evoke Matisse. In fact, she was an art major in college, but upon graduating, decided to get a regular job, so she could travel. She worked for the Federal Reserve Bank.
Philippe is from Brussels, descended from generations of Belgians. His father was an engineer, his mother a school teacher. He is in the exposition and trade show business. He came to the States twelve years ago with a friend on a business trip. The people he met liked Philippe so well that they convinced him to move to Chicago and go into business with them.
Penny was born in Carthage, Tunisia. She lived the privileged life of a French colonial until she was five, when the government was overthrown. Her parents moved their family to New York. Her American-born mother did ads for stores like Lord & Taylor. Her French-Italian father, like Phillipe’s father, was an engineer.
Penny and Philippe’s feelings about family life were quite different. Penny, whose parents, and later her sister, were divorced, saw marriage as “a crummy trap.” Phillipe, on the other hand, grew up in a stable, happy home where he felt loved and protected. He keenly wanted children, so much so that he and his first wife divorced over this issue.
Penny and Philippe, now thirty-four and forty-six respectively, have produced two handsome, but wildly energetic sons, Martin—called Binky— and Max. Their “third child,” Hamdia, is the orphaned daughter of Penny’s grandfather’s housekeeper. Penny’s grandfather bought Hamdia’s parents a home in Carthage and, while driving to see it, they were hit and killed by a speeding car. Hamdia, the eldest of four siblings, was adopted by Penny’s grandfather. When he died, she came to live with Penny and Philippe.
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