Category Archives: Classical Moderne

The Despont Difference

Posted January 22, 2016. Filed in 1920's-1930's Style, Classical Moderne, Clubby, The Aesthetes, The Collectors, Thierry Despont

Architect and decorator Thierry Despont is finally getting his due. Or, perhaps, it’s just a case of a passionate aesthete doing his life’s work happily without much fanfare. Whatever the case, I have long admired his work but remain dismayed by lack of accessibility to his near-forty year ouvre. Even his own website has little […]

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Timeless Chic at Clos Videlot

Posted June 8, 2015. Filed in Chateaux, Classical Moderne, Moderne, Salon Style, The Collectors, Villas

It seems that, in the world in which we live and orbit today, nearly every aesthetic image has been posted, pinned and uploaded into the ether. As a part-time blogger I often grow tired of rediscovering the same repeated information and imagery that can be found from the original source – accurately credited, I might […]

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Directoire-Deco: Henri Garelli

Posted June 3, 2015. Filed in 1920's-1930's Style, Art Deco, Classical Moderne, Directoire Style, Neoclassical, Salon Style

I want to share with you my favorite project of French-Italian architect and interior designer Henri Garelli that synthesizes three key architectural and decorative styles favored by the designer: 18th-century elegance, Neoclassicism, and 1930’s-style glamour. The World of Interiors published the Paris apartment of his client, a former confrére of President Mitterrand, in 2006 – […]

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A Secessionist Sensation

Posted December 3, 2014. Filed in Art Deco, Classical Moderne, Jean-Jacques Hervy, Surrealism, Vienna Secessionist Style

In our day and age of the tear down it is rare to stumble upon a completely intact dwelling representing an important moment in design. Such is the case of a Secessionist-style villa in Brussels discovered and lovingly preserved by interior designer Jean-Jacques Hervy. Designed by Belgian architect, sculptor and painter Joseph Dierickx in 1924 […]

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Charles Sévigny and Yves Vidal at Le Moulin des Corbeaux

Posted September 18, 2014. Filed in Charles Sévigny, Classical Moderne, Modernism, Yves Vidal

I was so delighted to rediscover the work of Charles Sévigny, who I featured in the last Throwback Thursday post, Charles Sévigny, that I pulled down more 1970’s issues in search of his work. I found it in the March/April issue of Architectural Digest. As I mentioned prior, M. Sévigny designed for the beau monde […]

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Forever Hicks

Posted September 17, 2014. Filed in Classic Chic, Classic Contemporary, Classical Moderne, David Hicks

Forty-nine years ago, in 1965, David Hicks decorated this apartment for an undisclosed client, referred to as “Lady X”, comprising two floors running the length of two 1830’s houses overlooking Hyde Park in London. In 2003 his son, Ashley Hicks, was alerted to its preserved state and was encouraged to view it when he was […]

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The Tempo of Gold

Posted July 28, 2014. Filed in Classical Moderne, Luxe Moderne, The Maximalists

The work of maximalist French interior designer Jean-Louis Deniot is easy to spot: luxurious, classically-inspired modern rooms for living in the 21st-century, where strong silhouettes and bold statements are juxtaposed within a soothing envelope of gray and gold mineral tones, stone, ivory and parchment. For a glamorous flat in London Deniot punctuated coolly elegant rooms […]

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LE BON MIX

Posted March 23, 2014. Filed in Chahan Minassian, Classic Chic, Classical Moderne

Featured in the February-March issue of French AD is a breathtakingly atmospheric pied-à-terre designed by architect and interior designer Chahan Minassian. So seldom are his projects featured in trade magazines that I may have actually let out a slight gasp discovering his latest. As glamour goes this is my kind of hedonism, with rooms bathed in an […]

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SWIMMING IN LUXURY

Posted January 21, 2014. Filed in Art Deco, Classical Moderne, Moderne, Thierry Despont

“Swimming in Luxury” was the title of an article written by Françoise Labro for Maison & Jardin in 1995 – a separate and complete article associated with my previous post, Passion, Discipline and Savoir-Fair, chronicling the collaboration between client and architect of a bespoke residential project in the western part of the United States. This […]

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Passion-Discipline-Savoir-Faire

Posted January 20, 2014. Filed in Art Deco, Classical Moderne, Moderne, Thierry Despont

“Passion, discipline and savoir-faire”: these are the three guiding principles of master architect and designer Thierry Despont. Tucked away in the shelves of my studio’s books cabinet I rediscovered a spread  that has long been on my mind since I first discovered it in 1995 in Maison & Jardin, that wonderful publication that met an […]

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