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Author Archives: Cristopher
A Venetian Vision
The last remaining vestige of Isabella Stewart Gardner’s Venetian vision for the music room at her Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts, palazzo-style mansion is this oil painting by Martin Mower painted in the late 1890’s. Destroyed at the turn-of-the-20th-century, Mower’s romantic paean to Gardner’s Venetian decorative tradition paints a dreamlike world where 18t-century carved gilt chairs […]
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Prince Charles’ Trematon Castle For Lease
In case you are wondering, I haven’t entered into the arena of real estate nor do I have any agenda from which I may benefit by promoting the sale of one of Prince Charles’ properties, in this case Trematon Castle. No, not in the least, any more so than would The World of Interiors, which featured […]
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Château Fourcas-Hosten: A Return to Glory
Posted April 16, 2015. Filed in Chateaux, Coorengel & Calvagrac, Directoire Style, French Country Houses, Louis XVI-Style
Château Fourcas-Hosten is a dream of a wine estate with a fairy-tale ending. Located in the Listrac appellation in the Médoc region of Bordeaux, it was conceived by Jean-Baptiste Hosten, a lawyer, in the 18th-century, its 116 acres planted with grapevines for as far as the eye could see. It was eventually ceded to the […]
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Mediterranean Blues
Posted April 8, 2015. Filed in Cy Twombly, Italian Villas, Mediterranean Style, Neoclassical, Nicola del Roscio, Uncategorized
The villa of Nicola del Roscio in the ancient fishing village of Gaeta, in the Lazio region of Italy, is quite possibly one of the most enchanting Italian villas I’ve laid my eyes on. My favorite – one I greatly admire and look to for endless inspiration – is the late Cy Twombly’s palazzo apartment […]
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A Southampton Cottage, Now and Then
Posted April 1, 2015. Filed in Chinoiserie, Continental, Cottages, Happy Preppy Chic, Ronald Grimaldi
Two visions – same house – now and then. You may likely recognize the woman welcoming us at her home. She is fashion designer Lorry Newhouse, and her Southampton cottage was featured in the April issue of Elle Decor. The second photo reveals a bit more of the same entrance, long before the front door […]
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Dreams Are Made of This
Once upon a time wealthy fabric merchants built for themselves a palazzo in then rural 15th-century Milan, where within its gardens Leonardo da Vinci strolled to recharge while working on “The Last Supper” in nearby Santa Maria delle Grazie. Belonging to the court of the Sforzas, the Atellani’s built their palazzo near the noble family […]
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The Louche Life
The title of today’s post, The Louche Life, may conjure for many a disreputable association, but I intend it in the most complimentary way, in the sense that “louche” signals a seductive hedonism in the realm of the interior as theater for sensory pleasure and delight. If sexy interiors make you squirm, do not proceed […]
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A Lasting Impression
If not for a photo of the somewhat humble and rustic facade of this charming house in a Swiss village one might assume from the photos below that the rooms contained within belong to a château in the French countryside. An admitted nature-phobe, Frédéric Méchiche has no interest in bringing the natural splendor of the outdoors […]
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A Man and His Houses, Part III
Posted February 27, 2015. Filed in Palladian-Style, Pleasure Pavilions, Villas, Villas & Villa Style, Wright Ludington
“October Hill” was collector and art patron Wright Ludington’s third and final home in Montecito. After moving to California in 1915 to attend the Tatcher School in Ojai he would make Montecito, California, his home, eventually inheriting his father’s Spanish-Colonial-style villa in 1926 at the age of 27, which he renamed Val Verde (see A […]
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A Man and His Houses, Part II
Posted February 26, 2015. Filed in Craig Wright, David Hicks, Leonard Stanley, Palladian-Style, Pleasure Pavilions, The Classicists, Villas & Villa Style, Wright Ludington
For many years I was under the impression that Wright Ludington’s villas Hesperides and October Hill were one and the same. I actually discovered Ludington’s final Montecito residence, October Hill, first in a 1983 issue of House & Garden. It wasn’t until I happened upon posts written years later by The Blue Remembered Hills on […]
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A Man and His Houses, Part I
Posted February 24, 2015. Filed in Spanish-Colonial Revival, Wright Ludington
Wright Saltus Ludington moved from Pennsylvania to California in 1915 to attend the all-male Thatcher School in Ojai, shortly followed by his father, Charles H. Ludington – a corporate lawyer, investment banker and editor of The Saturday Evening Post – in 1924. It was in nearby Montecitio that the elder Ludington purchased the Spanish-Colonial estate […]
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HOLLYWOOD AT HOME
Posted February 18, 2015. Filed in Holllywood Regency, Hollywood at Home
MARY PICKFORD and DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS JR. – The couple at their Beverly Hills home, Pickfair, in the 1920’s. Growing up in California I enjoyed the proximity, excitement and glamour surrounding the Academy Awards. For many years Architectural Digest took us inside the homes of our favorite actors past and present, and I always looked forward […]
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