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"Can We Talk?\nJoan Rivers Finds the Perfect Foil in Connecticut\n\"Joan said she wanted a country house,\" says Joe Cicio, who designed a 5,000-square-foot Connecticut house for comedienne Joan Rivers (above, in her living room). \"And I said, \u2018Well, you sure didn't buy one.' \" The existing house was low-slung, and the rooms were small.\nViews of surrounding hills, from what is now the living room, were not compromised.\nThe renovated room has Rivers's Meissen bird collection on a high sill and 18th-century bird engravings on a wall. All fabrics throughout the house are from Scalamandr\u00E9.\n\"I'm a one-man show,\" Cicio says. \"I work and make decisions fast. You have to trust your instincts and go.\"\nIn the living room, the massive stone fireplace and columns were the only elements left intact. The oil is by an unknown Hudson River School artist.\nLow ceilings were replaced with high, beamed ones.\nA 19th-century French landscape is over the mantel in the kitchen's sitting area, where Rivers entertains, eschewing a more formal dining room. The doors open onto the rear terrace and the 80-acre property.\nThe hall lacked natural light.\nAntique mirrors and trompe l'oeil windows depicting the residences of family and friends, including Prince Charles's Highgrove, line the renovated hall leading to the library/entrance gallery. \"It's my homage to Versailles,\" Rivers says.\nA dark, characterless room was expanded and redecorated as a rustic but refined guest room, with upholstered walls.\nTwo of the three guest rooms have adjacent sitting rooms. \"Joan's been buying and acquiring for this house for years,\" comments Cicio.\nRivers with Max, Veronica and Lulu.\nSliding-glass doors and recessed lighting were replaced by a window seat and an arched ceiling.\n\"I've always loved pink,\" Rivers says of her choice for the master bedroom. Painted palm trees add a \"silly, whimsical and hopeful\" touch. The portrait of Rivers and her daughter, Melissa, is by David Remfry."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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