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a glazed brioche doughnut from Lovebirds, in Kittery on the March 2025 cover of Down East magazine

Look Nook

Look Nook

In a gallery-like corner of their dining room, Portlanders Jean-Raymond “Gino” Desruisseaux and Marcelle Medford cultivate a Caribbean influence.

TEXT BY RACHEL SLADE
PHOTOGRAPHED BY ERIN LITTLE
the dining room of Jean-Raymond “Gino” Desruisseaux and Marcelle Medford


<h3 style='text-align: center;'>Island Prints</h3>
<p class='p1' style='text-align: center;'><span class='s1'>Medford and Desruisseaux moved to Maine two years ago, with their now-8-year-old son, when Marcelle accepted an assistant professorship in sociology at <a href='https://www.bates.edu/' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer'>Bates College</a>, in Lewiston. Medford, who grew up in Queens, New York, says New England was an unknown country to her until a few years ago. She met Chicagoan Desruisseaux while studying at the University of Chicago. “It was our sense of adventure that led us to choose Maine,” she says. This pair of prints honors the couple’s heritage, traditional scenes of Medford’s parents’ native island of Trinidad and Desruisseaux’s parents’ native island of Haiti. The upper print shows a house on stilts and the lower one women washing clothes in a stream. “Everyone in Trinidad has prints like these in their homes,” Medford says.</span></p>
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<h3 class='p1' style='text-align: center;'><span class='s1'> Boscoe Holder Print</span></h3>
<p class='p2' style='text-align: center;'>Holder, who died in 2007, was an internationally renowned Trinidadian painter, dancer, choreographer, musician — a real 20th-century Renaissance man, maybe best known for his portraits of dancers and friends. His work, Medford says, is often found in homes on Trinidad, and Desruisseaux and Medford have two other prints from this female figure series. After moving in, it was a while before the couple got around to framing their collection of prints, but the art collection adds color and personality to the dining room — which is welcome, since it now doubles as Medford’s office and teaching dais (her classes are all online this fall). Desruisseaux, an account manager with a resourcing firm, keeps a separate office in the couple’s West End Victorian.</p>
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a glazed brioche doughnut from Lovebirds, in Kittery on the March 2025 cover of Down East magazine