Innehållsförteckning för Oct-15 från ELLE DECOR

ELLE DECOR AT WESTEDGE ELLE DECOR was pleased to be a media sponsor of WestEdge SF, which is part of San Francisco Design week, on June 4-5. ELLE DECOR Senior Editor/Writer Ingrid Abramovitch hosted a panel discussion, “Built to be Sold,” with industry insiders Geoffrey De Sousa, Michael McEwen, Forest Dickey, and Seema Krish which explored the challenges and opportunities of maintaining quality craftsmanship while building a financially successful business. For the full event recap, visit westedgesf.com. COSENTINO DESIGN CENTER SHINES LIGHT ON STYLE The brand new Cosentino Manhattan City Center recently opened in New York’s A&D Building and is stepping up the design game. Digital tools offer an enhanced experience with optimized product selection and customization for visitors seeking beautiful surfacing materials. cosentino.com TUFENKIAN ARTISAN CARPETS Define interiors with…

A NIGHT UNDERS THE STARS WITH MANSOUR On May 5, Benjamin Soleimani of Mansour threw a lavish dinner party for 150 A-list designers and guests in honor of Michael Boodro, Editor in Chief of ELLE DECOR, in the garden of his beautiful Beverly Hills home. LEGENDS OF LA CIENEGA As media sponsor of the 2015 LEGENDS of La Cienega's Where Muses Dwell, ELLE DECOR co-hosted the Power Lunch with Compas at its stunning L.A. showroom. Industry partners and designers from around the world celebrated L.A.'s design quarter in fashion. The Hearst Design Group—ELLE DECOR, HOUSE BEAUTIFUL, and VERANDA—also hosted an LCDQ cocktail party with Moore & Giles and Harbinger, where guests were treated to canapès and cocktails from celebrated "entertainologist" Lulu Powers and mixologist Jim Meehan.…

Mike Feldman and Jason Jones of Parabellum are into leather— specifically American bison hides, which they turn into chic bags, wallets, and other fashion accessories outfitted with ceramic hardware. The duo met a decade ago when Jones, a lifelong Angeleno who made stage outfits of leather for Lenny Kravitz and Bruce Springsteen, among others, owned a store on Melrose Avenue. Their first collection hit shops in 2010. Feldman, a native of Detroit, describes himself as the entrepreneur of the pair, while Jones designs everything from fashion pieces to desk accessories, saddles, and a chesterfield sofa. The concept for the line came from Jones. “He brought a lump of high-tech ceramic he found online to my 30th-birthday party,” remembers Feldman. “It had been developed for the military. We tried but couldn’t…

Ignoring naysayers has worked out just fine for Claire Distenfeld. Three years ago, at just 26 years old, the New Yorker had an idea to open her own fashion boutique. It was going to be youthful yet luxurious, stocked with her favorite independent designers, and located right on her home turf of the Upper East Side. “People told me I was crazy,” she recalls with a laugh. “I had no retail experience, no connections, and they were telling me I should be searching downtown instead of uptown.” How wrong they were. Fivestory, the multi-brand concept store she opened in a townhouse on East 69th Street with the backing of her father, Fred Distenfeld, has been a success from the get-go, attracting uptown denizens looking for adventurous ready-to-wear from designers like…

1. Paris-based interior designer Pierre Yovanovitch created a cleanlined master bathroom warmed by a fireplace when restoring his 17th-century château in Provence. The tub, positioned in the center of the room, is by Agape, and the fittings and towel rack are by Dornbracht. The floor is marble. 2. Designer Lynda Murray and architect Chad Oppenheim fashioned a spa-like retreat for the bathroom of filmmaker Michael Bay’s Miami home. Etched-stone tiles sheathe a wall that separates two distinct bathing areas; the shower fittings and sink are by Boffi, the countertops are of Macassar ebony, and the cast-concrete tub is a custom design. 3. The master bathroom of Alice Childress and Christopher Daniels’s downtown Manhattan loft, designed with the help of Courtnay Daniels Haden, includes an antique freestanding marble tub, a vintage…

ELLE DECOR: Have you always lived in Berlin? MICHAEL ALBERT: I moved to Berlin 14 years ago. I’m originally from farther south in Germany, near Munich. ED: What is your neighborhood like? MA: It’s called the Mitte, which is German for middle or center. It was in East Berlin before the wall came down. Now it’s up-and-coming with cafés, shops, and galleries. One of the best things about our building is that we look out onto a park, which is unusual for Berlin. ED: Is your partner, Stefan Schnorr, also a designer? MA: No, Stefan works for the government. We have very similar tastes, but he lets me make the design choices. He’s the best possible kind of husband. ED: How old is the building? MA: We broke ground about…

As a special correspondent for Vanity Fair, Amy Fine Collins not only writes about fashion and old Hollywood, she’s also one of the judges of the International Best Dressed list and a member of its Hall of Fame. She can also be found, often arriving late and dressed to the nines, at Manhattan’s A‑list parties. What you might not guess about this gifted sophisticate is that she’s got a mile‑long, yard‑wide sentimental streak. It doesn’t just include the usual family and friends, it embraces all of her “things.” Some of us are chuckers and some of us are keepers; Collins is a hard‑core keeper. At Falcon Hill, her ramshackle weekend house on Fishers Island, New York, she’s keeping and curating a catchall of layers. “And not just layers of ownership,”…

TOTALLY IN TUNE Lenny Kravitz has always exemplified cool, both onstage and off. So it’s not surprising that when he turned his talents toward interiors (he now has his own design firm), he would channel his boho-glam style for both private clients and real estate developers. Now his first collection of furniture and accessories, designed in collaboration with CB2, brings rock-star style home. The pieces include soft goods, lighting, and furnishings, all imbued with the spirit of the 1970s. “It was a period when high fashion met hippie chic and blended in with rock-and-roll glam,” he says. Accordingly, flame-stitch patterns, chrome, brass, and glossy black take center stage. Kravitz, who cites a range of influences—among them Louis Majorelle, Antoni Gaudí, and Cesare “Joe” Colombo—adds, “Creativity is creativity, as far as…

“No ideas but in things,” decreed poet William Carlos Williams in the 1920s. From the dawn of the Republic to the heyday of Pop Art, Williams’s mantra has been the philosophy of countless American painters enthralled by the colors, textures, and shadings of fruit, flowers, fauna, and furniture, alone or in evocative combinations. Nevertheless, the still life was long maligned for representing the banal rather than the sublime—the late-18th-century British historical painter John Opie carped that it required nothing but “imitative monkey-talent.” “Audubon to Warhol: The Art of American Still Life,” a comprehensive survey at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, makes a case for the genre as a forum for innovation, particularly when it was embraced by modernists as a way to render the whirligig of consumer items and new…

From its mostly empty front window to its spare interior and single row of clothing racks, the Tomas Maier boutique on Bleecker Street in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village breaks many, if not most, of the rules of contemporary retailing. This is capitalism at its most restrained. But simplicity can be deceiving. Linger in the shop a while and there is much to discover: Leather wallets and jewelry are encased in glass-topped wooden tables, belts dangle from cords attached to custom metal pegs, and drawers open to reveal additional wares in alternate colors and sizes. “I myself don’t like shopping,” Maier says. “When I design a store, I don’t like the product to be too much in your face. It is important to dose it and to leave room for desire.” The…

Need a gown for a glittering wedding? Looking for a pair of rabbit ears like the ones Carole Radziwill wore on The Real Housewives of New York City? There’s an app for that. PS Dept. (the initials stand for “Personal Shoppers”), the brainchild of former fashion executive Michelle Goad and business partner Wolfgang Klinker, connects time-starved women and men with a network of “shoppers” who work at some 50 luxury-fashion retailers, from Derek Lam and Diane von Furstenberg to Phillip Lim and Theory. “It was hard for me to find time for shopping before,” says Goad, a new mother. “With a baby, it’s nearly impossible.” A veteran of Donna Karan, Marc Jacobs, and Barneys, Goad had her “aha!” moment in a store: “I saw sales associates giving out their cell…

Considered for decades to be hopelessly craftsy, clay is now au courant. Despite practitioners as important and diverse as Kenneth Price, Peter Voulkos, and Betty Woodman, the medium was often dismissed by the art world as merely decorative. But as a new wave of critically acclaimed artists—including Dan McCarthy, Thomas Schütte, and Sterling Ruby—embrace the material, snobbery about this most ancient of art forms is finally dying out. It’s a refreshing turn of events for Peter Schlesinger, who has been toiling under the radar for decades. His sensuous ceramics— overscale urns and vessels, with and without loopy handles; smallscale figures; plants and groves of trees—have always had an engaging sense of nonconformity, an offbeat glamour and wit. The classically curvaceous hourglass and gourd shapes of the urns are adorned with…

1 Jewelry designer Lara Bohinc incorporated her signature eclipse motif into her Solar rug for Christopher Farr Editions. Made of hand-tufted wool, the 3′3″ x 5′10″ rug is available in a limited edition of 150 and is offered in Grey, Purple, or Blue, shown. 310-967-0064; rugeditions.com. 2 Anais, from Jim Thompson’s new Forbidden Colours collection, merges a geometric ikat pattern with a matte Thai silk. It comes in seven colorways, including, from top, Celadon, Kiwi, and Coral. 800-262-0336; jimthompson fabrics.com. 3 A handcrafted solid brass base adds a twist to Jan Showers’s Milan chair, inspired by midcentury Italian designs. The piece measures 27″ w. x 33″ d. x 39″ h. and can be covered in c.o.m. 214-747-5252; janshowers.com. 4 French designer Olivier Gagnère partnered with Pouenat to create the sophisticated…

WHEN ONE HAS SPENT more than four decades in the employ of one of the world’s master interpreters of the good life, living it inevitably becomes part of the job. Buffy Birrittella has worked side by side with Ralph Lauren for more than 40 years, having joined him when he was just starting out. “It was during what the fashion world called the Peacock Revolution, when John Weitz and Bill Blass were making a splash,” Birrittella says. “Ralph was the upstart, and I found his work really exciting.” The former fashion journalist discovered Lauren in the early 1970s while editing the pages of the Daily News Record, the menswear brother publication to Women’s Wear Daily. She championed his work, then talked the burgeoning designer into hiring her. Birrittella was among…

“I’m not interested in trends,” says Xavier Lust. “My goal is to create pieces that will last.” True to his aim, the Belgian furniture designer has spent the past two decades amassing a body of work that combines the simplicity of the Space Age with an almost organic sensibility that looks back to the whiplash forms of the Belgian Art Nouveau architect Victor Horta. The distinctive look derives from the pioneering technique for folding metal—without a mold—that Lust developed shortly after graduating from the Institut Saint-Luc in Brussels in 1992. Chairs, consoles, and candlesticks are made from perforated sheet brass or polished aluminum, twisting elegantly upon themselves as if unfolding before your eyes. His glass-topped S-Table—available exclusively through Galerie du Passage in Paris— stands upon a plinth of writhing bronze…

Anybody who has met Marin Hopper knows she loves to tell a good story. After all, the former fashion editor has plenty of ’em, thanks to her family of Hollywood eccentrics and glamorous dynamos. Her father was Dennis Hopper, her mother is actress Brooke Hayward, and her grandfather was mega-agent and producer Leland Hayward. So when Hopper began designing her own line of handbags in 2008, it was natural that her creations would draw upon her family tree. “So many brands have to invent their heritage story,” she says, gesturing toward a portrait of Slim Keith, her step-grandmother, hanging in her new Manhattan flagship. “Ours is 100 percent true!” Her collection, Hayward (named after Leland), was originally launched as a bespoke business, and Hopper still takes pride in the line’s…

Diane von Furstenberg’s reputation rests on the wrap dress she designed 40 years ago. But she should be just as celebrated for her imaginative patterns: “At this point, I must have 15,000 prints,” she says. Last year, she and decorator Olivier Gelbsman mined her archive to create a striking line of home fabrics for Kravet. The Belgian-born designer has also made an important impact on her adopted home of New York City, where she was a force in the creation of the High Line park. This fall she launches a new handbag, Secret Agent, and debuts a second season of her reality-TV show, House of DVF. But von Furstenberg says she is ready to devote more time to the foundation she shares with husband Barry Diller. “It’s time,” she says,…

Sometimes a half is better than a whole. When space is tight, a demilune (or half-moon) table can be the perfect shape: Its straight edge fits flush against the wall while the curved top eases traffic flow. “It’s a natural for a foyer or hallway, because there are no corners to bump into,” says Los Angeles decorator Joe Lucas. And it can be utilitarian or decorative, as needed: “You can use it as a station for keys and mail, or as a display for a floral arrangement.” A pair of demilunes can add symmetry to a space. “In a living room, they can flank a fireplace,” says New York designer Amanda Nisbet. Demilune consoles were popular in France during the mid-18th century, and many are still inspired by traditional examples,…

fashion designer Andrew Gn can’t remember the exact age at which he bought his first piece of porcelain. Maybe he was 12, perhaps 16. He is also incapable of explaining his overriding love of ceramics in general. “I just feel good with them,” he says. “It’s like designing a collection. You don’t ask yourself why you’re doing orange this season. You just do it.” Gn’s new apartment, in a late-19th-century building in the north of Paris, is packed with porcelain. Masks invoking Africa by midcentury master Roger Capron adorn the living room fireplace. The kitchen shelves hold vases by Jacques Blin, Robert Picault, and Pol Chambost, while the library is home to everything from a seventh-century Vietnamese urn to a vintage vase by Dutch sculptor Jean van Dongen. “He’s basically…

A WEEK BEFORE her second child, Estella, was born last spring, fashion designer Giovanna Randall was feeling restless. “You know that adrenaline burst you get at the end of your pregnancy?” she says. “So I decided to throw a dinner party.” She and her husband, Eric Laufer, quickly dispatched an invitation to friends, who arrived at the couple’s freshly decorated apartment in New York’s Greenwich Village to find their nine-monthspregnant hostess preparing an entire meal from scratch, including, as a grand finale, a homemade pie that she pulled from a striking cream enamel Lacanche double range. For Randall, who designs couture and bridal fashions under her label Honor, food is much more than sustenance: It’s a source of deep pleasure and a metaphor for everything she touches. “I’ve always said…

ROZAE NICHOLS has an obsession with pattern and color—the wilder and more evocative, the better. As the creative mind behind the fashion label Clover Canyon, known for its architectural silhouettes fashioned from bold, kaleidoscopic prints of her creation—top sellers at Neiman Marcus and on Net-a-Porter—Nichols clearly never got the memo that the little black dress reigns. Which is what makes the Laurel Canyon home she shares with her husband, Ian Murrough, who co-owns a boutique ad agency, all the more extraordinary. A mere 1,000 square feet, with two bedrooms and a single bath, the house is a study in virtually monochromatic, pared-down cool. Built in 1948 and dominated inside by the deep tones of redwood and brick, it is, Nichols says, “a visual reprieve” from a life spent collecting textiles…