by SY

AN ENDORSEMENT!

We are about to encounter another worthy colleague of the Minimalist Persuasion! He is a Master of the Unadorned and the Austere.  Robert’s design and architectural quest was to remove any and all extraneous objects from sight.

Please meet:

Robert Mallet-Stevens, a Minimalist Icon!!!

Introducing the urbane, the witty, and the versatile Robert Mallet-Stevens!

At age nineteen, he entered the Paris Ecole Speciale d’Architecture with the second highest grade on the entrance exam. A year earlier, he spoke at an exhibition with this profound example, “Let’s suppose that two men are walking together on the Avenue des Champs-Elysees. One is dressed like everyone else, with a vest and a bowler hat (this is after all 1904);  the other is dressed like an eighteenth-century lord, wearing a wig, red heels, and a sword.  Which of the two would appear more eccentric making people turn around and stare?”  Pausing, he concluded by saying, “We are unjust to modern architecture:  it is logical, it belongs to its time.”  Mallet-Stevens was eighteen!

And at that early age he established his creed, the first duty of an architect or designer was that of “belonging to one’s time.”

(His early career was spent in presenting drawings and models, writing articles, offering his theories on radio programs and designing movie sets.)

Brash, and brilliant, the acclaimed 1923 film, L’Humaine showcased a range of the decorative arts, using an intriguing cast of characters and interiors.

  L’Humaine

 Mallet-Stevens received accolades and recognition for his modern movie set designs and architecture that showed influences of Cubism and Art Deco leading to a 1923 major design commission from Charles and Marie-Laure de Noailles for a vacation villa at Hyeres, France. This summer villa was to be high in the hills above the city of Hyères. Construction took three years.

Mallet-Stevens received this commission as his first major building and design project. Charles de Noailles called for a compact building with picture windows facing due South.

 “The Pink Salon”
The Pink Salon is a voluminous underground room featuring large skylights and stained glass windows. It was used for large and lavish parties. The upholstered chairs are covered in a rubberized fabric.

Alternative chairs designed for the Hyeres villa included tubular metal sling back reclining chairs that were lacquered green.

In 1925, the French Government invited twenty countries to a showcase event to promote Modern Decorative Arts introducing an array of avant-garde designs and styles. Germany was not invited because of its role in World War I, but Austria and Hungary were invited, as was the new Soviet Union. Apparently, not entirely understanding the purpose of the exhibit, the United States chose not to participate. 

Titled: The International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts highlighted the new modern style of architecture, interior decoration, furniture, glass, jewelry and other decorative arts in Europe and throughout the world.

The tallest structure in the exposition, and one of the most modern, was the Tower of the Tourism Pavilion by

Robert Mallet-Stevens

It was built using thin layers of reinforced concrete for the two main elements. One of the main goals regarding the tower and the main auditorium was to highlight and introduce the use of building with inexpensive and massed produced materials.
It became a focal point of the Exhibition!

Unfortunately it was torn down after the Exhibition.

One of the honors bestowed on Mallet-Steven was the naming of a street in Paris as the “rue Mallet-Stevens” where he designed six houses. In addition to designing private homes, Mallet-Stevens designed shops, factories, a fire station in Paris, apartment buildings and interiors. He preferred clean facades with smooth gray and white surfaces, large horizontal openings and little or no ornament.

Nicknamed the “Facade of Faces ”
The home of Monsieur et Madame Mallet-StevensBruer Chair: Pattern designed by Mallet-Stevens and Embroidered by Madame Mallet-Stevens

Twin Brother Sculptors Jan & Joel Martell owned a home on rue Mallet-Stevens that was celebrated for its “mushroom staircase.”

Jean Manusard, the nephew of Mallet-Stevens paid this tribute to his uncle, “my uncle was a symbol for the word style.  When I was thirteen, he introduced Mozart and Jazz, primitive painting and tomorrow’s architecture in small doses… to me…..”

And another family member, his brother said this jokingly about himself and their other siblings, “We didn’t do too badly, for people who didn’t have much left to them: Robert got everything!

Mallet-Stevens designed the Riefenberg entry hall, presenting his hallmark use of stained glass and geometric tiles.

THE PERFECT SCENARIO:

Mallet-Stevens received a dream commission from Paul Cavrois in Croix, France for his family of seven children. Croix is a northern industrial French city with an important railway junction where Paul Cavrois owned seven textile mills. The entire work, down to the last detail was for Mallet-Stevens to create carte blanche a modern villa exemplifying the sheer volume of the built property with its complete absence of decorative ornamentation. Mallet-Stevens designed the furniture, chose the fabrics and was in charge of installing state-of-thee-art equipment (central heating, telephone, electricity, elevators, electronics, window treatments, a radio-loudspeaker, lighting——both direct and in-direct, etc.  including the use of industrial materials and techniques (of glass, metal, steel) and he also designed the gardens. Equally so, the homes Mallet-Stevens designed were known to be of notable size. Especially when you opened the door and stepped into the Villa Cavrois.

The Villa Cavrois in Croix had sixty rooms!

.

The Entrance Hall

Partial view of master bedroom with furniture designed by M-Stevens

A portrait of Mallet-Stevens where the artist used the color palette that was predominant in the architecture and interiors most used by the designer——blending colors of yellow, tan, and gray.

An unsuccessful kidney operation at age fifty-nine would cause an early death.

Postscript: The Villa Cavrois lives on…..

At the beginning of the second World War, the family moved to another family chateau and the Villa was commandeered by the German army and turned into a barracks where 200 German soldiers lived.

After the war, the Cavrois family returned to the villa and rebuilt and redecorated it to its 1932 style for the Cavrois  family.

And far into the future the French government in 2001 acquired a large part of the Villa Cavrois property to be a Center for Cultural Affairs. It took thirteen years to restore it to the villa’s 1932 original state by an architect of historical research.

If you happen to visit Croix, France today and stop at the Villa Cavrois you will not have to stretch your memory to envision an authentic Robert Mallet-Stevens architectural property.

No Way!

We shall have the pleasure of of a personal connection——of knowing the Villa’s history as we open the door in 2026 to capture a moment in time. It’s our chance to get to enter and step into this authentic and perfectly-planned…

Robert Mallet-Stevens Chateau!

Sy’s Salient Points: We have come across how individual Minimalist Designers evolved in this three-part series and their methods of removing each essenstial nonessential detail from their architectural and interior design projects.

For the purpose of this blog, we have one more Minimalist designer to discuss in the future and to say he lived as a Minimalist is an understatement——John Pawson truly lived it——and I quote,

“Miinimalism is the presence of absence.”

Happy “Semester at Sea” Darling Blaire

UPPING THE ANTE!

Lifestyle shifts cropped up and imaginations quietly soared. A jim-dandy design phenomenon continued its launch onto the Paris purview. From the ground up a new group of visionary decorators proceeded to showcase and debut standout interiors.  (Much of the decor of the thirties almost seemed shocking representing a summit of streamlined and functional interiors.  No art, no bibelots, no table accents.  It epitomized a time that defined that bleak hopeless period of the Depression and became an agent for simplicity or minimalism using subtle varieties of handsome surfaces.)

PART TWO:

The design drama of MINIMALISM and MODERNISM UNFURLED!

But firstly, there is an underlying story of a family of German Nationals who were put under house arrest while living in Paris. Leon Frank was a prominent wealthy Jewish banker who married his own niece, Nanette, and the couple had three sons. All their assets were seized by the Germans when they invaded France in the First World War. The two oldest sons became French soldiers and within two weeks of each other each boy was killed in action. Beside the tragic loss of his sons, Leon’s deep despair was equally reinforced by the realization that possibly his inherent sons were killing their personal relatives, members of their own family!
Leon committed suicide by jumping out of the window of their apartment.

It was the third, and youngest son, Jean-Michel whose unique Minimalist style of decorating would explode upon the Parisienne decorating landscape.

His first pursuit as a student was the study of law but an early profound interest in art and literature would be reshaped into decorating. It was said his work offered a sense of mystery and poetry.  His ability to avoid any unnecessary decoration or ornament still left the room with a feeling of the greatest luxury because “his rooms were settings for people, not for paintings or sculptures or art but there was a richness of surface of gold lacquer, snakeskin, parchment,  straw marquetry” …Battersby

He formed a partnership with Adolphe Chanaux and together, they opened a shop.

His atelier became a locale where the kindred spirits of Diego and Alberto Giacometti, Christian Berard, and Emilio Terry influenced and worked as teams at times. This group would fulfill commissions together or each would work solely to outstanding achievements.

Their  sophisticated design interpretations were in demand on both sides of the Atlantic.  JEAN-MICHEL FRANK was considered to be one of the greatest decorators of the Twentieth Century. Frank used imaginative textures, simple geometry, and understated luxury. He had meticulous craftsman creating his design compositions and blended vellum, lacquer, ivory, suede, calfskin, and morocco.

The Story of Parchment:  In my mind, parchment is the original writing tablet, but I cannot take it with me or buy it in stores. It is not made from wood pulp, it is not even close to a paper product. Nope and nada!  Parchment is made from animal skin. Sheep, calves, and goat skin is scraped, dried, and stretched to be used for writing  material.

The art patrons Vicomte and Vicomtesse de Noialles commissioned Frank to decorate two rooms in their salon. The de Noialles’ rooms were to be the most important of his career befitting a trendsetting and cutting-edge decorating scheme.

Jean-Michel often used parchment as a preferred decorating style.

He featured it as a wall-covering at the de Noialles salon by having craftsmen adhere large squares of parchment to completely cover high walls and ceilings that had been stripped of all moldings.  Furniture in white leather, low shagreen tables while bronze lamps contrasted with straw marquetry crystal and ivory. The facade of the fireplace had mica tiles applied in a brick pattern completing the salon design.

The de Noialles dining room highlighted furniture of macassar ebony, a dense hardwood of black stripes over yellowish or reddish brown colors.

Vellum covered the walls of the Noailles dining room’s showcasing macassar ebony furniture with a Modernist carpet on parquet.

Frank’s rooms were purposely left bare and boxlike. He preferred not to hang pictures and used sparsely placed Greek fragments as the sole decorating accents

This sudden and unexpectedly brusque form of decorating was bound to bring humoresque comments. Two making the rounds at that time were: When the multi-talented French poet Jean Cocteau saw the de Noialles rooms, he said, “They look as though they have been robbed!”

The second famous off-repeated joke had a guest entering an apartment through a foyer that was completely empty and going through two more empty rooms to then enter a dining room that held only a table and two chairs. The hostess was sitting on one of the chairs staring at the plain table that held only the sculpture of a nose. At the surprised look of her guest, the hostess reverently said, “Ah, but the nose is from Alexandria,” finishing the joke.

The de Noialles were devoted art patrons and eventually began to hang paintings and add art to Frank’s pristine design, and a rift was born between client and designer.

Another method used by Jean-Michel was the style of straw-marquetry. He showcased the process lavishly in his interior decorating.

The Story of Straw-Marquetry: It was a time-consuming method of slicing open blades of rye or oat straw, soaking the straw in hot or cold water and then ironing the straw flat and adhering the flattened straw into various styles and patterns. It is the process of turning humble pieces of straw into dazzling and sumptuous facades.

The Salon of Jean-Michel Frank was designed employing straw-marquetry on his walls offering a soft golden glow to his salon.

Cabinet of Straw -Marquetry in fan shape design.

Rich textures applied throughout the Frank Bedroom: Mirror and screen of straw-marquetry, coffee table of wood and mica.

Equally favored by Frank was the technique of using shagreen on his signature furniture designs.

The Story of Shagreen: Shagreen is an untanned leather that is covered with small round granulations. It is the rough skin of various sharks and rays covered with small close-set tubercles. It is usually dyed green. Frank had his shagreen (sharkskin )sanded for a smoother finish.

The haute-couture dress designer Elsa Schiaparelli whom we met in Minimalism Part One of the Shocking Pink fame entrusted Jean-Michel Frank to decorate her perfume boutique. He turned it into a gilded bamboo cage featuring her new perfume scent “Shocking.”  It is a giant aviary of black metal with painted flowers attached randomly to the the poles.  Display cases highlight her panoply of perfumes. Frank’s and Elsa’s Birdcage salon was a resounding success.

Frank decorated not only the Schiaparelli Perfume Salon but also her boutique, homes, and her first perfume bottle, “Salut.”

most surprisingly, he began to add colors to his decor. Below in the Salon of Schiaparelli, Frank used curtains of a shimmering rubberized fabric accented with an orange and yellow leather sofa amid paneled walls with chintz accents.

He continued to create decorating milestones with his partner Adolphe Channaux forming a cultural hub of elegant furniture repertoire and lighting fixtures of terracotta, gypsum, and ivory.

Vases, lamps, and small tables and stools were inspired by Cubist, Chinese, and Egyptian styles.                                               

Vibrations of harms way were working their way to Paris with the sound of Nazi boots on the ground.

Jean-Michel took his esthetic talents to Argentina where here once again he fulfilled his eminent reputation with numerous decorating contracts and commissions. An Iron and Leather settee designed in 1937, still in circulation today.

But he did not stay, he emigrated to New York, brilliantly designing the Rockefeller apartment with bold dramatic colors and eye-catching interiors. As usual, he incorporated art and furniture by the other decorators in his continuing decorating  circle.

And instead of gathering speed for a continuation of more creative vision such as the Templeton Crocker San Francisco commission…  there was to be an absence that would soon overtake the decorating world. Jean-Michel’s is lifelong melancholy was ripping him apart.    The evocative change-maker, Jean-Michel Frank, Decorator committed suicide at age 46. Speaking from his heart and soul,   he said,      “I do this for no reason but ill health. I ask all my friends who have been so good to me to forgive me. I thank them deeply for  trying to help me, but I have no strength to go on. I am too ill.”

(His personal possessions were left in his apartment in Buenos Aires.)

The Parsons table was designed by Jean-Michel Frank while he was working at Parsons Paris——a design school in Paris and an equally famous partner Parsons School in New York City.

Parsons tables are often intended for use as modern or contemporary furniture, and their striking design has made them popular as coffee tables, dining tables, side tables, and occasional tables. Less-expensive versions are also available, which can be easily stacked, disassembled, and reassembled. Most are typically made of wood, metal, or plastic, and they are frequently employed in interior furnishings as well as patio and even lawn furniture.

Jean-Michel Frank was a first-cousin, once removed, to the young diarist Anne Frank although they never met.  His works are highly sought after by leading collectors worldwide. Many of the premier auction houses offer his pieces, and prices are often in excess of 200,000 Euros.

Sy’s Salient Points:

Straw-marquetry was resuscitated in the mid-1970’s by one young woman in Paris.  Lison de Caunes, whose grandfather, a premier Art Deco designer used straw-marquetry in his furnishings and bequeathed bags of straw to her from his collections.

Lison de Caunes

(Caunes said, “I love that you can create things so incredibly refined and luxurious from such humble material.” It has been her life work for over 40 years.)

Architectural Digest November 2015

Research From: Lectures by Sheila Yates ASID New York Javitts Hall, slides from her collection and various internet sites.

Happy Summer Holiday, Darling Blaire

We’re going to enter an engrossing period of fast-paced change in the world of design!
Firstly, there would be a gathering…But, where?  You know how it is. New beginnings always mean LOCATION, LOCATION! But which location?

Granted, the U.S. had Frank Lloyd Wright; Germany, the Bauhaus; and England, Wm. Morris, but Paris had a whole conglomeration of memorable characters who would flourish and create radical new design movements of

MINIMALISM, SURREALISM and MODERNISM.

They would entwine and develop almost simultaneously!

THE CORRECT ANSWER???   OF COURSE, PARIS!

Surely the most mixed bag of design diversity ever imagined. If the economy was a virtual roller coaster, the center of design was a giant ferris wheel, steeped in pomposity, going round and round.

The same thing over and over.

The new idealists were bored. They wanted their place in design history and all were ready. Combined with their human story, a perfect scenario was created for our vicarious visit as we navigate some important design history.  Hop On Board!

One of the earliest of Minimalist’s ‘in the beginning was Adolf Loos who wrote in 1908 “Ornament can be equated with crime.” And he set forth his reductive principle of plain moldings and the barest of essentials creating furniture that was solid, stolid, and unadorned as shown in his hallway.

Loos was creatively unique and outspoken. He strongly supported an article with an awesome title discussing the value of having buildings designed by more than one architect expressing this view…”I am an opponent of the trend that considers it desirable that a building along with everything in it should be designed by one architect…the building can have a monotonous appearance as a result.” The title of this article doesn’t seem to have a lot of hope… “Spoken into the Void”.

He entered an international skyscraper competition and designed a colossal Doric column…

1922

the Chicago Tribune considered it a design travesty and it was easily rejected.  It was a time for new design waves… design that was on the brink of fresh insights and innovative ideas.

Therefore, it seems to be expedient that for any of us experiencing run-of-the-mill closet overload——too much furniture and never enough wall space for art collections to consider implementing today’s motif:

MINIMALISM!!!

Loos studied internationally, Chicago, New York, Vienna, and Paris where he became enamored with the black American dancer who rose to phenomenal Parisian fame and popularity…her tribute to minimalism was in the form of dancing minimally, no clothing as Josephine quipped…

“I wasn’t really naked, I simply didn’t have any clothes on.”

On June 3, 1906, Josephine Baker was born Freda Josephine McDonald in the slums of St. Louis, MO. Growing up, she cleaned houses and babysat for the wealthy. She was a mere child when one employer burned her hands as punishment for putting too much soap in the laundry——Josephine was eight years old.    Trying to get to a better place, she ran away at age 13, married and divorced in that year, learned to dance and was signed to dance for a vaudeville show. When she was a 15 year old, she met and married for the second time a railroad worker William Baker. Her second marriage was also short-lived but she kept the Baker name throughout her life.

From there, she went to Harlem where she performed in musicals, danced to bands led by Duke Ellington and other American jazz musicians eventually arriving in Paris at the time when there was  a newfound obsession with black culture, and a generation of French men and women who collected African art, jazz, and danced the Charleston. When she swung onstage in her costume of bananas sewn to a skirt and a necklace of swinging beads er costume, consisting only of a short skirt of artificial bananas and a beaded necklace, she became an iconic image and a symbol both of the Jazz Age and the Roaring twenties. Baker was stunning, as shown in this image by the artist Paul Colin, 1927.

She enchanted audiences by dancing a comic jungle-type Charleston. (Theatre des Champs-Elysees spokesperson Ophélie Lachaux in 1921 told the AP, “And, that’s why they asked Josephine to dance something ‘tribal’, ‘savage’, ‘African-like’.”)

She advanced her career in ways unprecedented for a woman of that time. Leading couturiers in the ’20s, dressed Baker, jewelry was designed and created for her that she sold along with her famous hair and skin pomades. With the profits, Baker moved into the Château des Milandes,

a 24-room mansion in southwestern France; adopted 12 children from around the world; called them her “Rainbow Tribe”

and kept a menagerie of exotic companions such as a cheetah.

Josephine was always a woman of the people and for the people: During World War II, she aided the French Resistance by using her celebrity status to capture information for that organization, smuggling secret messages in invisible ink on her musical sheets. Josephine housed resistance fighters at her chateau and supplied them with visas. She attended parties and diplomatic functions including parties at the Italian Embassy that brought her in the orbit of high-ranking Axis bureaucrats. She collected information on German troop movements, and which harbors or airfields were in action. After the war in her uniform of a Lieutenant in the Auxiliaire Feminine, the Women’s Air Auxiliary of France.

Josephine was confident that her celebrity and connections would protect her, and that no one would suspect her of espionage. She wrote down intelligence on her hands and arms, pinning notes inside her underwear.

She said, when asked to volunteer, “France made me what I am. I will be grateful forever. The people of Paris have given me everything… I am ready, captain, to give them my life. You can use me as you wish.”   And Josephine was ready!

During the March on Washington for Freedom and Jobs in Washington, D.C. in 1963,  she was, notably, the only official female speaker to give an address at the March on Washington. Josephine stood alongside Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. In her speech in front of a sea of people, she declared:

“You know, friends, that I do not lie when I tell you I have walked into the palaces of kings and queens and into the houses of presidents… But I could not walk into a hotel in America and get a cup of coffee, and that made me mad.  And when I get mad, you know that I open my big mouth.  And then look out ‘cause when Josephine opens her mouth, they hear it all over the world…”

She hid Jewish refugees and weapons in her château. The Bakerskin cosmetics she had developed and sold helped pay for the poor and wounded after the war. Never once did she ask for or receive compensation for her wartime activities.

She received the Croix de Guerre, the Médaille de la Résistance, and Légion d’Honneur.

She died on April 12, 1975 and more than 20,000 people crowded the streets of Paris to watch the funeral procession on its way to L’Église de la Madeleine. The French government honored her with a 21-gun salute, making Josephine Baker the first American woman buried in France with full military honors! (* Vogue 1916)

Loos was not the only man enamored with Josephine, there were scores of others.

Ernest Hemingway described his fascination with Josephine Baker and later added that she was “The most sensational woman anybody ever saw. Or ever will.”

This is the house Loos designed for her to be built in Paris with horizontal bands of black-and-white marble, (some say this was because she was a  mulatto, probably far-fetched).

An enclosed swimming pool taking up two floors would be a dominant focal point. Skylights and a circular cafe was included for an entertainment center.

(One writer suggested the stark and cantilevered design baffled Josephine.)

The house was never built. 

PARIS (AP) — France is inducting Josephine Baker — Missouri-born cabaret dancer, French World War II spy, and civil rights activist — into its Pantheon, the first Black woman honored in the final resting place of France’s most revered luminaries.

French President Emmanuel Macron decided on her entry into the Pantheon, responding to a petition. In addition to honoring an exceptional figure in French history, the move was meant to send a message against racism and celebrate U.S.-French connections.  A coffin carrying soils from the U.S., France, and Monaco — places where Baker made her mark — were deposited inside the domed Pantheon monument overlooking the Left Bank of Paris. Her body stayed in Monaco, at the request of her family.

Josephine will forever be loved by the French people!

EUGENIA ERRAZURIZ  offered an admirable & exceptional second example of Minimalism!

Born in Chile of enormous wealth from family silver mines, she married a rich landscape painter Jose T. Errazuriz and moved to Europe. And yet, Eugenia made this quote her mission—— and she meant it…   “Throw out and keep throwing out!

Elegance means Elimination!   Eugenia Errazuriz!”

She introduced the color, Inca Pink to Parisiennes from her native Chile. It became a popular sensation when it was reintroduced as Shocking Pink by the Couturier Elsa Schiaparelli who made it her signature color by mixing just a little white into magenta in the late 1930’s. A new fashion color was born. Other couturiers would follow!

Eugenia charmed, captivated and influenced society, poets, musicians, writers and designers.

Her path to elegance was light years ahead of its time. It consisted of simple materials – brass, cotton, linen, muslin curtains, whitewashed walls and highly polished floors of fir, pine and stone.

“A house that does not alter,” she liked to say, “is a dead house.” “If the kitchen is not as well kept as the salon … you cannot have a beautiful house,” she declared.

The entry level to her home in Paris.

She combined her living and dining rooms into a single space.

Eugenia loved using antiques in her selective displays where her table was set with eighteenth century silver flatware saying, “It would be wrong to forget that people of taste existed in the 18th century.”

Living Room

Eugenia kept two paintings in her living room.

Both by Picasso

She stood out for the unconventional sparseness of her rooms.There were no formal bouquets. Instead, plants were displayed in their own containers.  She was partial to the scents of jasmine, lavender, lemon verbena, and rose geranium.

Eugenia launched a vogue for integrating garden furniture into upper-class interiors. The rudimentary original models of public gardens tables and chairs would emerge in the most elegant classic modernist forms.

In his book,  “The Glass of Fashion, 1944 “

Cecil Beaton paid this compliment to Eugenia, “Her effect on the taste of the last fifty years has been so enormous that many of the concepts of simplicity, can be laid at her remarkable doorstep.”

She forever valued art and sent Stravinsky 1,000 francs a month, plus a supply of tobacco.  He was HER composer. Picasso became HER painter, completing twenty-four drawings of Eugenia. Their friendship spanned 42 years.

White on White Portrait of Eugenia Errazuriz by Picasso 1921

Eugenia sent Picasso to her Biarritz villa to honeymoon with his first wife Olga. 

“The pianist Artur Rubinstein:” I have never known anyone with the unfailing uncanny taste of this woman. Whether in art, music, literature or interior decoration, she see, hears, feels, smells the real value, the real beauty.”  But Eugenia’s pursuit of exquisite simplicity and her generous donations to artists would not be cost-effective.

As the Second World War ended, her money had dwindled and she sold her belongings.

She was unable to restore her spirits. She returned to Chile and when seriously injured in an auto accident, said, “I am tired of living.  I wish to help God to take me out of this life.”

Eugenia stopped eating and died in 1954,—

“a minimalist to the end!”

Sy’s Salient Points: I had the privilege of meeting one of Josephine Baker’s adopted sons in New York City. My husband, daughter and I were there when I was scheduled to give a lecture on this very topic Minimalism at the Javits Center during a Thanksgiving Holiday. We had been told there was Restaurant and Supper Club called Chez Josephine on Theatre Row owned by Jean-Claude Baker. As I understand, he was not officially adopted by her, but became a part of her life when young and took her name.

We made reservations for six, two family friends joining us. Someone in our party asked if the owner was there that evening——he was and Jean-Claude joined our table for a bit  in our front window alcove table.

Needless to say, it was a lovely interlude as I shared some snippets about my lecture of Josephine, and he shared a story of the woman he called his Mother.

Jean-Claude Baker in Chez Josephine

Blog illustrations are from my original slide presentation for ASID, a design organization and various internet sites.  Part 2 of Minimalism soon to follow…

Happy May Day and almost summer vacation Darling Blaire!

WAS SHE INFLEXIBLE AND HEADSTRONG?? MOST ASSUREDLY!

HER MANTRA——

“IF I LIKE IT, IT’S RIGHT, IF I DON’T, IT ISN’T!”

DOROTHY was,———to the “manner born,” accustomed to grand houses, servants to answer to her every need, and an endless supply of money; best known as wealth and privilege. From both her mother’s and her father’s side——her ancestors and relatives were the first settlers in our American frontier(1630)——including, a long list of statesmen and a signee of the Declaration of Independence.  And another great, great Grandfather owned 75 clipper ships in Newport Harbor that carried valuable merchandise to and from the Orient.

BLUE CHIP

PLEASE MEET————DOROTHY DRAPER!

But firstly——there was a bit of a glitch——a galumph and a garump. An aberrant intervening began at age twelve and kept going into her teen age years. Years that would achingly loom for this little young lady!

Remember Alice in Wonderland when Alice’s life became “Curiouser and curiouser”? Because at age 12, her life took on Alice’s “curiouser” gauntlet.  Did she step through the looking glass to become Alice in Wonderland? She did!

Dorothy’s mirror showed a fledgling adolescent who kept growing taller and taller——taller than all the boys and girls in that small super upper crust enclave of Tuxedo Park in 1901 where she lived. Finally, after four long years during a family dinner party, she heard a man at a nearby table, exclaim “La jeune fille——queue jolie,” “What a good-looking and graceful young girl!” Dorothy finally emerged as a lovely statuesque 5’9” young woman. And, she had learned to glide into a room making every entrance an occasion, as her mother did.

Heads turned!

Hence forward, her indomitable and invincible spirit would carry her through.

Dorothy married handsome, tall, and witty Doctor Dan Draper from the Draper bluestocking family of clever, well-read, and highly intellectual women and men. Dan had been “a man about town” and their early years of marriage were spent socializing abroad in Europe and the U.S.                                   

It was also a time when she unknowingly had a glimpse into her future! (Dorothy decorated Dan’s bedroom in a fabric that cost “twenty cents a yard,”——with an unheard of fabric in her set, “blue denim!”  Blue denim would not become popular until the early 1950ties.) This was 1912!

Dan Draper and Franklin Delano Roosevelt were school friends, as were their wives, sharing many youthful events. As Dan’s prominence and brilliance rose, he began spending more and more time away from home embracing the study of exceptional diseases, one of them being poliomyelitis. (Dan became President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s personal Doctor at the onset and throughout  his struggles with polio.)  In the future he would also be credited as being the father of psychosomatic medicine after studying in Zurich with Dr. Carl Jung, the disciple of Freud.

Despite the fact that she and Dan had three children, Dorothy had unlimited free time. A live-in nanny resided with the children exclusively. Dorothy found she loved decorating their home. Visiting friends and guests were enchanted with her decorations——offering to buy their house with her furnishings and move right in——no changes. The Draper’s sold and moved down the street to a larger house. Guess what! Someone once again made a bid for their house and moving was becoming a pattern of life.

In the course of time, Dan Draper spent more time at his lab and completely lost interest in a social or home life with Dorothy.

At first decorating homes did keep Dorothy engaged, but she detested pleasing her client’s taste——and was ecstatic when asked to design a new museum in Greenwich Village. The goal she set for herself was to perk up and spice up museum decor——sooo——Dorothy designed vibrant sapphire blue satin curtains lined with a new shade——“chartreuse” as the linings. The equally colorful pull cords were bright scarlet.

It was a splendid accomplishment for this nouveau decorator!

Unprecedented design foresight was anchored deeply in Dorothy’s design DNA. She splashed onto the scene with a bright and effervescent color palette that evoked areas of nature, banishing beige and brown from her palette. calling them “gravy” colors.

In the twenties, Dorothy was a pioneer in the use of oversized flowers, (cabbage rose chintz)———bold contrasts and graphic black and white marble floors pushing and bending the boundaries of safe choices into more daring personalized interiors. Her signature colors were dark green, dead white and scarlet with a sometimes nod at turquoise and fuchsia. AND, she never cared about the opinion of others——with no training, she savored her own decorating taste!

In the 1930ties, she was given a marvelous commission——the lobby of the Carlyle Hotel.

Her lobby floor was of black and white marble while using images of a Holy Roman Empire theme. With dramatic friezes of horsemen, gladiators, runners and bust of Roman heroes, satin draperies and circular banquets softening the look, the lobby was a standout and would continue to be for multiple years. The drama was complete and the Carlyle did not renovate the lobby for years.

BREAKING THE MOLD!

REALITY!

Dan, after 17 years of marriage asked for a divorce. It was unexpected. She could not believe Dan preferred another woman and one twenty years younger. Dorothy was deeply hurt even though she had been devoting almost complete time to her own career. They had been a charismatic couple, rich, photogenic and popular. A beautiful family that tangibly had begun to lead separate lives. Divorce terrified her and in her mind meant that she was now a social pariah…

AND MORE! Equally heart rendering for Dorothy was the confluence of disastrous monetary events that also put her at the epicenter of shocking losses. She could not fathom that her early life style would change.  She deserved a rich, monied married life——her birthright was carved in stone. She was convinced she had been promised to be rich forever, but then…

——1929———— IN A SPLIT SECOND——HER MONEY WAS KAPOOT!
DOROTHY WAS RELATIVELY  “POOR”!

A feeling of darkness led to a point where she felt she couldn’t cope but she would and did so. Impelled to seek a form of forceful mental strength, Dorothy sought and found a successful mentor. His teachings of self-belief would virtually take her to to a world of decorating stardom. With fervor and zeal, Dorothy studied and accepted the visualization techniques of Norman Vincent Peale.  (Followers were to “overcome their fears because nothing consumed energy like fear.”)

TIME TO SOAR, DOROTHY——
CHUTZPAH!

Destiny was omnipresent when another developer admired her talent, initiative, energy and imagination on the Hotel Carlyle lobby. He hired Dorothy to resuscitate a block of dreary cold-water tenement flats he owned on Sutton Place. The neighborhood was not desirable and she was given a very small budget for this “address of nobodies.” There was one positive——an excellent river view!

It was said that she paced up and down this Sutton Place street and then the spark of an idea surfaced that would bestow mega attention on Dorothy and that dreary urban landscape. Her idea was to make the building disappear!——

FROM TENEMENT FLATS TO IN-DEMAND LUXURY APARTMENTS
DOROTHY painted all the flats JET BLACK!

The windows, fire escapes and balconies were a flat white and for individuality each and every door was painted a different bright color. They became sought-after luxury apartments. And it increased her  power two-fold——she got society to move to an unfashionable neighborhood!

When Dorothy began her popular business in 1925 she believed anyone could have her look of “Great Beauty” by eliminating clutter, conspicuous antiques, and matching furniture ensembles. She called her style,

“Modern Baroque!”

She needed to create new opportunities as hardship still continued to overshadow life with the market’s 1929 financial wreckage. She found balance by moving into one of her own newly designed Sutton Place flats with her third child, Penelope who was given the one and only bedroom while Dorothy slept on the sofa.

Dorothy painted everything in that small scale apartment sky blue——walls, moldings, ceilings, furniture, picture frames and even a tall mahogany secretary  along with the same blue color draperies.  She wrote an article for magazines on how she had made their small apartment look larger sharing details and how-to’s——Vogue and Harper’s photographed it and included Penelope’s dog.
The woman’s magazine Good Housekeeping recruited Dorothy to write a monthly column focusing on affordable ideas for making homes comfortable.

Boundless ambition led her to write books on self-decorating and entertaining for middle class housewives as she continued to remodel her life into one of  positivity.

Side note: I have a copy of this 1939 book “Decorating Is Fun” with 245 pages filled with well-thought out directions and prudent meticulous advice for that time period. Following ex:

She adored mixing styles and periods in her own haphazard manner and loved large black and white marble floor tile with walls of white plaster appliques using grand scroll and shell motifs——her plasterwork, shiny black patent leather walls, striped wall paper walls so wide they had to be stenciled on, art deco, chintz, and her love of the baroque were her forte.

Her punched-up color wheel combined grass green, scarlet, wine, watermelon, coral, turquoise and yellow.  Always providing the piece de resistance in her eyes———lots of gleaming white and black!

She did not like small men throughout her whole life, plus she did not like wood——painting it white, also she abhorred posts, pillars, spindles, wainscoting, panels, spandrels, shutters, sconces, molding, beading and fretwork.  

Years later when Dorothy was asked if she felt combining home life and a career to be difficult. She replied, “Absolutely not!” (Dorothy failed to mention she was helped along with a household staff of at least seven, two live-in maids, a live-in cook, a nanny who lived in the nursery, a day cleaning lady, a furnace man, plus a secretary or two for her business.)

Dorothy  continued to push boundaries through innovation, championing sustainability while delivering timeless solutions well into the 1950’s.

Dorothy died at age 80 in 1969.

EXAMPLES FROM FAMOUS DECORATING COMMISSIONS BY DOROTHY DRAPER:
PLASTERWORK MOTIFS from HAMPSHIRE HOUSE APARTMENTS

 BLACK AND WHITE MARBLE FLOOR——DRAKE HOTEL——CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

WALLPAPER EXAMPLES

THE GRAND HOTEL——MACKINAC ISLAND, MICHIGAN

THE 1952 PACKARD  “FASION-KEYED BY DOROTHY DRAPER”

“THE HIGH STYLE OF DOROTHY DRAPER” EXHIBITION WHERE A WHOLE ROOM WAS CREATED USING HER EXACT DESIGN WORK——

MUSEUM OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK. MAY, 2006

Dorothy Draper’s most iconic commission was the Greenbrier Hotel in West Virginia featuring 500 rooms and. surrounded by 3,000 acres and is a story/blog in itself!

INSIDE THE GREENBRIER

THE CLOCK ROOM

CANDOR, POISE, AND SELF-BELIEF

DOROTHY DRAPER
SHE WAS INVINCIBLE!

Sy’s Salient Points: Previously there was a New York Design Week every year  at the end of October where I was asked to lecture for a few years. At that time, glorious Christmas decorations appeared like magic. My husband, daughter and I had a small tradition of going to the Carlyle Hotel for drinks and hearty snacks after my lecture.  We always invited some New York friends to join us for evening cocktails. I have many, many good memories of those joyous occasions.

My husband and I stayed at the Greenbrier and attended lectures while also exploring the interiors and grounds of the Hotel’s 3000 acres——not all 3000!  The brightly colored interiors are fun and dynamic. On one section of the grounds are small cottages to rent. Dorothy nicknamed the hotel “a Brobdingnagian monster of a bowling alley,”

Carleton Varney, her protégé who worked with her bought the firm after Dorothy died and it is still in her name today. Varney’s two sons now run Dorothy Draper & Co.

Various print and encyclopedia sources were used for this blog.

HAPPY ST. PATRICK’S DAY DARLING BLAIRE

ST. LOUIS UNION TRAIN STATION  1894

I took my mother’s hand as we made our way into St. Louis’s 1894 spectacular Union Train Station filled with freeways of train tracks, gold leaf ceilings, arches and richly colored stained glass windows. My mother and I walked down the vast indoor entry staircase under the glorious Whispering Arch.

I couldn’t resist——I whispered to my Mother, “Did you hear a whisper?  She whispered back to me that we had to proceed to another area to hear our whispers. “Right now,  we immediately need to find our train track. ”

The arch was stunning with a Tiffany stained glass window in the background.

We were on our way to a new adventure: my first ice skating adventure. It was a summer ice skating program and we were to be there only three weeks because we did not want to leave my Daddy too long who was at home alone. I would take lessons from a coach who taught beginners and then I would take a figure test where three judges would check to see if I was on the right skate edge when I created a pattern on brand new clean ice.  (Perfect circles counted big time and that was pretty much what my first test comprised——perfect circles, traced on the right edges——Big Time For Me!))

Example: (Skater in below illustration is practicing part of an advanced pattern where three circles were completed on one foot using inside and outside edges with loop patterns on top and bottom.  After completing those first three correct circle sizes on clear ice, he is practicing it over and over . Here he is pushing off to start one more time on an inside skate edge.)                                                                                                                             

At 11 year of age, I was petrified to stand in front of those judges and do my first simple circles of edges. But that was only the genesis of what would be years of more tests, years of standing in front of judges on clear ice (a nervously and jittery, hopeful)  skater creating those compulsory figure shapes well. Moving up to more and more difficult tests.  During  the winters, I skated  at my home rink in St. Louis.

My summer skating experiencer s took place in different states and Canada with continued learning sessions of foot work, jumps and spins. Whole days are set aside for testing and the skaters who tested on that day checked on bulletin boards at the end of the day. If you found your name posted on the bulletin board, you passed. Thrilled and nonplussed, my eleven year old self saw her name that first summer in Minnesota——I passed my first test!

I want to offer a few breadcrumbs of a new design force in the design trade that is and will-be a gee whiz true-value happening now and forever more; a topic I would like to discuss more in 2026. It’s an important and extraordinary doozy.

If we travel behind the scenes to 1984, we happen upon Professor Edward O. Wilson of Harvard University who wrote a book titled…..

“Biophillia.”*

(When I first encountered the word biophillia, no kudos from me. I thought it sounded like one more fancy term that would never be important to me or would ever interest me,— I  was wrong.) As Professor Wilson explained, “…it may well tell us why individuals fill their homes with plants and pets and are instinctively drawn to certain landscapes.” In other words, it is a human tendency to commune with nature and be closely tied to other forms of life. Biophillia completely captured the attention of architects and designers with myriad bells & whistles.

Because the basic principles of this universal future trend features the affiliation of nature inside our homes and buildings. It offers a system of ideas intended to strive and explain how to recuperate, regenerate, and make people healthier by helping other life and even planetary systems actively introduce natural light, outside views, greenery and different techniques of construction. Bring the Outside In!

That is an important premise of the doctrine of “BIOPHILLIA.”

(One precept of this design phenomena is a return to the framing of buildings using the construction method of “mass plywood”.)

The aforementioned example shows the sensitiveness of Biophilia where this building used a linked network of exposed metal structures including staircases that were erected with minimal “on-site labor.”

Equally important in the above building is the employment of the “mass plywood” method where massed plywood architecture uses large portions of salvaged trees. It is more affordable and is a faster build.)

The architectural plans of the 2028 San Antonio Airport will include another component of the use of “mass timber” that shall contribute lightness and flexibility. An ideal method for fast and lean construction crews completion.

Biophillia has abundantly diverse and copious facets to delve into and my blog will explore more in the future.

In the spirit of showcasing the attributes of healthy wellness is the gift of beautiful outdoor scenery, I want to again turn back the pages, this time to the 1990’s and share a story and a poem that led me to being a teeny-tiny participant in a yearly art gallery show and I am not an artist!

My husband and I shared a friendship with a talented couple, one, a painter and his partner, a mat artist. They offered a yearly doozy of a fantastical art show in their home of a “thousand rooms”.  Guests walked over bridges, around small pools and outdoor landscapes into gallery rooms throughout the property. Their presentations were genuinely thoughtful and engaging.

The artist asked me if I would write a poem that described a favorite painting of his for that year’s gallery show.

My poem is a Lilliputian expression of Biophillia where I hoped my prose would share a form of synchronization with the majestic outdoors of the natural world and lead us “into the gallery” through this artist’s artful vision.

“DESERT SHADOWS”

Nature’s monuments belong to the shadows and to the sun, to the rain, to the clouds, and to the wind, – where enchantment is spun

Noble canyons rise to rocky summits and stand alone venerable thickets of brush where chasms are honed the lure of the desert offers its dry river of stone

Glowing – a shaft of light

Celebrate the season – celebrate life!

Poem by Sheila Yates

My husband and I agreed, the whole event of writing my poem and attending the gallery show was a lovely and special celebration!

Sy’s Salient Points:

*The term biophilia was used by German-born American psychoanalyst Erich Fromm in The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness (1973), which described biophilia as “the passionate love of life and of all that is alive.”

I love walking around the grounds and park sides of my retirement facility. It reinforces pleasureful upbeat feelings and a sense of belonging to nature. I bring the feelings of being “outside back in” to my apartment.

I  hope you enjoyed reading Desert Shadows and my wish to each and everyone is for all to have……A Harmonious and Festive and Safe Holiday Season!!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year My Darling Blaire

I had never heard of this park! Nor, was it like any other park in my memory. Yes, it had rolling hills of greenery, trees and flowers galore, streams, rivers and lakes, but inside this park was a small village—a locked village. Residents were free to come and go; it’s just that you or I could not come and go. We could not enter those locked gates unless we had an invitation——we had to FIT IN!!!   (I personally would have had to peek through the gates.)

This was the home of a noteworthy and moneyed society. Hands down: you just had to be really, really rich to live here. It was called Tuxedo Park and following is its story and the story of a pretty little girl named Dorothy Tuckerman who was born into this exclusive community.

Tuxedo Park was in the Ramapo mountains about 40 miles from New York City and its representation of the Gilded Age when it opened in 1889. Originally only twenty-four future residents received a welcoming nod to live in this park where only the preferential lived!

Firstly, it’s time to talk about a group of the gilded glitterati of the late 1880’s and one of the “glitterers” who lived in New York City. This glitterati was the first man to be called a millionaire. Count Pierre Lorillard IV, the tobacco king!

And…from day one, Pierre started out in the haute monde. He grew up in a 68 room solid stone mansion of precise fabrication.

Count Pierre Lorrillard IV,  inherited thousands of acres of undeveloped wilderness from relatives in the state of New York that had formerly been a winter utopia for local Indian tribes. Pierre wanted more and more of that wilderness——and Pierre was an

outstanding poker player.

EASY PEASY———,

DUCK SOUP!

Pierre went on to win a lot more of that acreage with those poker skills of his from some of those same relatives. He formed a private fishing and hunting community in his beautiful out-of-doors countryside surrounded by awe-inspiring large and small lakes. This region of timeless beauty was filled with blueberries surrounded by clumps of rhododendrons and dogwood.

Pierre Lorrilard imported 1800 workers from Italy in 1885 and built them a shanty town with a mess hall and bunk houses. Wasting no time, Lorrilard hired an architect, Bruce Price to design cottages covered with russet and gray shingles along with buildings that had the appearance of having been there for hundreds of years making those 5,ooo acres of wilderness worth more by tucking living spaces into the surrounding woodland while still keeping the original woodland with its magical heart. His workers built thirty miles of graded dirt roads and a water and sewage system——the first complete one in the world.

They built a main picturesque gatehouse manned by a police force and police station, twenty-two cottages, two blocks of stores, village stables, a post office, drugstore and market, all covered in moss and lichen. Then the Italian craftsmen built a four-story clubhouse matching the other old-time looking structures with one hundred guest bedrooms and one bathroom. There’s more!

A village theatre complete with stage footlights. He called his village and park, “Tuxedo Park.”

        About Tuxedo Park: Part One

Tuxedo Park opened in the fall of 1886 with a gala Autumn Ball!

Seven hundred guests arrived on three special trains from New York City and were then transported to the clubhouse in green and yellow brightly painted open horse-drawn buses and tallyhos. Gamekeepers came out from the forest wearing green and gold uniforms while walking along the roads wearing Tyrolese hats decorated with large perky black cock feathers. The whole picturesque domain conveyed an atmosphere of celebration. Sightseers were allowed to roam the property on this one opening occasion and could be found checking out the one bathroom in the clubhouse. Some were transported in barges on the lakes with eight-men rowing crews wearing sailor suits. Continuing with the green and gold club colors were full liveried attendants who worked as footmen, waiters and hallmen to attend to clubhouse guests.

AND

One of the founder’s sons, a member of the Lorillard family had  just returned from England where he was a guest of the Prince of  Wales who wore a short hip-length formal jacket. No tailcoat. Lorillard had the tails removed from his tailcoat and wore a Satin Lapel Dinner Jacket to the First Autumn Ball. He named his tailless black jacket the tuxedo after his father’s,”Tuxedo Park.”

The “tuxedo” short jacket caught on and became fashionable for formal wear.

In reality, Tuxedo Park was a fortress. You could not enter without an invitation. There was an eight-foot fence around the property with a private police force on guard around the park grounds day and night and at each of the four gates to the dominion.

Children played freely. In winter, there was skating and skiing. servants dragged sleds and bobsleds to a toboggan slide a half mile long that was electrically lighted at night. Sleigh bells jingled as the children traveled between the distant great housesthey played on their ponies at horse shows, had dog shows and bicycle races, and swam in the lakes.

Prior to Tuxedo Park becoming a luxury village to the rich, this unparalleled Indian hunting and fishing sanctuary was to be no more. Lorillard had the lakes stocked with one hundred thousand bass and German carp. Unfortunately for the bass, nothing could stop the carp from eating the bass. The carp grew fatter and fatter!

Eventually the children managed to domesticate the deer whereupon they could be found adorned with pink ribbons.

Furthermore, when the beaters flushed the imported quail and pheasants toward shooting parties, the birds soared and surpassed the hunters flying to the blue skies of freedom or escaping to open fields where they thrived and enjoyed their future liberty.

One of the first cottages to be built was the Bruce Price Cottage designed by Bruce for his wife Josephine. He was also the architect for all the original buildings in Tuxedo Park.

BRUCE PRICE COTTAGE

TUXEDO PARK ARCHITECTURAL VISIONS OF BRUCE PRICE:

THE CHANLER COTTAGE

THE LORILLARD FAMILY COTTAGE

ORIGINAL TUXEDO PARK CLUBHOUSE

There was also a Tuxedo Park Club membership of four hundred who were invited to visit and stay in the clubhouse as guests for parties, sporting events, and celebrations and be a part of this American posh one-of-kind home town.

It was the first Country Club in the U.S. Guests came by trains owned by some club and resident park members.

Pierre invited two dozen patrician families to join his exclusively gated community of residents. Paul Tuckerman and his bride, Susan were among the original invitees to reside there. They were among this group of a private sort whose names did not appear in print at this time, but were extremely rich.

Susan Tuckerman’s flair for new fashion ventures caused raised eyebrows as she became a style-setter when she rode her horse wearing a divided-skirt sitting astride her horse, Susan continued to do so when she could be seen strolling around the lake wearing a tweed skirt that cleared the ground showing her ankles and yet, Susan was still considered to be a perfect lady.

Three years after the bride and groom moved to their new home, their first child was born. Her name was Dorothy and one day in the future, Dorothy would turn heads with her own brand of style-setting. One of her childhood friends was her cousin, Eleanor Roosevelt. The Tuckerman’s erected five residences in Tuxedo Park throughout the years, including a red brick mansion where they lived with their two children—Dorothy and her brother, Roger.

Surrounded by woodland, Dorothy’s home was impeccably decorated and treasures were tastefully displayed. There was a desk owned by a Tuckerman ancestor, Oliver Wolcott, signer of the Declaration of Independence, wine coolers given to his son by George Washington and imported Chinese screens, silks, furniture and carvings brought from China and packed in green tea.

THE CHILDHOOD HOME OF DOROTHY AND ROGER TUCKERMAN

Although the children of the village roamed freely throughout the property, they were not allowed to roam into the Tuxedo Park Clubhouse, but it did allow the children to enter its prestigious interiors on Sunday afternoon where the clubhouse served hot cider and doughnuts. Of course, wearing their best they were also under the supervision of their nannies and governesses.

DOROTHY DRESSED FOR CIDER AND DOUGHNUTS

Exclusions existed even among the richest of the rich who might wish to live in Tuxedo Park. Actually all races and creeds were excluded unless you were of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant breed. Mark Twin who rented a cottage in Tuxedo Park said,”Good breeding conceals how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of others.”

You could say, this was exemplified at Tuxedo park!

         MARK TWAIN OUTSIDE HIS COTTAGE

And the pretty little girl named Dorothy grew up under the tutelage of tutors and her governess Mademoiselle with a lot of freedom and not a lot of formal education.  A two year stint at a fashionable Manhatten all-girls school was an unhappy experience and she was allowed to return home to study with tutors and Mademoiselle. Her independence and individuality were her major strengths and yearly trips to Europe compiled her excellent French and knowledge of art, light and color, antiques, fashion and jewelry.

But first, she had to experience the frustrations of being an exceedingly tall young teenage girl…

Part Two, Coming soon.

SHE WAS INVINCIBLE!

Sy’s Salient Points:

This extraordinary biodiverse village and architectural wonderland with its beautiful landscapes made this historic village unique.

The predominant figures in Tuxedo Park concentrated on inclusivity and virtually no flexibility. In 1873 Mark Twain co-authored a book titled “The Gilded Age,” a satire of the leading figure of the day. The label stuck for the period from roughly the 1870s to the early 1900s, an era characterized by industrialization, wealth, and political corruption. 

Research: Lecture series——Sheila Yates, author——Carleton Varney, Britannica, Wikipedia

Happy Halloween Darling Blaire!

I have invited a “guest writer” to share a part of the magical happenings from the land of Rapa Nui. Her story brings forth the sensory experience of the strength and humanism found in this unique historical site. Blaire’s visit has enriched my knowledge of the compassionate kindness of the Rapa Nui community.

EASTER ISLAND

       The Moai Statues at Sunset: My granddaughter Blaire joins the traditional “good night” sunset.

(Every statue on the island faces into the island. Are they watching over the past and the future inhabitants of Rapa Nui ?)

Blaire:

“Easter Island is the most remote place that you can travel to by commercial airplane. This summer, I had the opportunity to go with my parents, and it was an incredible experience that I will never forget. From Arizona, we took an hour flight to Los Angeles, eleven hours to Santiago, and then another five to Easter Island. Between flights, we spent time in Santiago exploring the city, flying down to Patagonia, and seeing the beautiful glaciers. 

History/Sights:

Easter Island is known by three different names: “Easter Island”, “Rapa Nui”, and “Isla de la Pascua”. These three names might sound extremely different, but one thing is for certain – the island is full of history that connects us as people. It is known most famously for its statues, the Moai. I will get to that later, but first I want to touch on some of the other amazing experiences available. My top three would have to be …

1.  The Quarry (Ranu Raraku)

2.  The statues themselves (Moai)

3.  The volcano (Orongo)

The Quarry:

The Quarry (Rano Raraku) was definitely my most anticipated and rewarding sight. Upon entering, there is a “toll/check” booth. You have to have a guide to enter, and some of the sights you can only visit once on your trip! After that, there is a small table with different kinds of rocks. Each rock has a specific purpose for creating the statues, and the location of the quarry was chosen with immense precision along with the rock’s durability and appearance.

(The hats on some Moai are red lava and the statue’s bodies are black lava. Each kind comes from a different part of the island.

Walking through the actual quarry was a life changing experience. There are statues along the way that have been broken or are just simply “practice” pieces. So, they are discarded and left in their final resting places.

Each statue is cut out in one piece, so there is no way to fix it once it breaks! There are even some statues that had been started on during the chiseling process, but are forever frozen in their original place.

The people of Easter Island would then take the finished statue and transport it to its final location.

The Actual Statues:

The Statues (Moai) After a 15 minute drive, we arrived at the most famous sight (Tonariki) – 15 statues lined up in a straight line. There are three more empty spaces, forever empty and waiting to be filled. The process is the same: walk up with our guide, the toll person stamps our passes, and then we enter. The statues are huge – some at least 40 feet tall! Most are bare headed, and some had special “hats” on, that were made at a different preparation site.  Each face/body is specific and different.  I stood there in awe, imagining myself speaking to the Moai, hearing them say, “I am here to protect my people; please respect us as we respect you.” I wish I could have gone up to feel closer to them, and to bask in all their glory. I could not, because of the barriers protecting them. They are exquisite!

Walking around the island, there are statues everywhere, left not fully finished. Some people say that there are bones buried underneath, but no one knows the true reason for these statues being lined up in their meticulous spots. I asked my mom what she thought and she said, “The basic things you need to survive are water, food, and shelter. After those are secure, people can begin to create.” This perfectly explained the purpose in my head. We might not know the exact reason, but we know that people like, and also live, to create. This gives us worth and joy in today’s age, so I have zero doubt that it was the same in the past.

The Volcano:

The volcano (Rano Kau) was actually our first stop of the day. We visited Orongo, the village at the top of the volcano. This sight is one of the few that you need a guide, but can also enter on your own from the opposite side. The side that we entered with our guide featured a few signs with information on the volcano, as well as a perfect view of the “Motus” – three islands serving the “bird man competitions”. This is when each chief, or person representing the chief, had to compete to show their rank on the island. A special bird would lay its eggs on one of the Motus. The competitors had to climb down the volcano into the water, swim to one of the islands, find the egg, and swim back with it intact. The first person to find the egg wins!

There is also another way to access the volcano, through driving or hiking. My parents and I hiked and got to see the other side of the volcano. It’s a gorgeous view – looking at a giant empty hole in the ground. It’s surreal to think about, that this volcano used to spew lava that hurt, and sometimes killed, people.

Now, the previous angry and violent creation is a hollow and filled with beautiful flora and fauna. I love to think about Mother Nature, and of what she is truly capable. The volcano also has healing properties, being where “Rapa Mycin” was founded (an important anti organ rejection drug), along with being one of three of the island’s main sources of water. Yet another one of earth’s beauties and legacies.

Culture:

Another favorite part of this trip would have to be the people. As someone who has traveled a fair amount, I know that locals aren’t always fond of Americans. They also aren’t usually afraid to show it. But from the moment I stepped off the plane, I felt welcomed. Each person local to the island has their own personal story, and it shows in their every day lives. There is virtually no crime, and it feels safe to walk at night. Even as we walked through the cemetery – each person was dedicatedly mourned. Their resting spots are kept clean and are decorated, with string lights hung around to keep the area bright. The people of the island value their own in death just the same as in life, which I found especially beautiful and moving. As we walked around the island, multiple people told us, “yurana”. This is the native tongue for hello. Some people spoke magnificent English, and others spoke broken English, but everyone always made sure to say “yurana.”

So, yurana! To everyone, thank you for reading about my experience and my section of my Granna’s incredible blog, and thank you for reading about my experiences and taking the time to get to know me, just as you do with my Granna each month.                         

I love you Granna – thank you for asking me to be a part of this, and good wishes in your happy birthday month!

Sy’s Salient Points: Blaire’s story takes us to a far, far distant shore where her fresh viewpoint infused our experience of Rapa Nui’s calm mood. We met the kind hearts and gentle souls of the island’s peaceful and stable populace who are surrounded by their bold iconic and ancient forms dispersed amidst them in their unspoiled land.

Blaire Darling, Thank you for being the first Guest Writer on my blog. I love the fact that your energy, flair  and warmth speaks to us through your writing.

Love,
Granna

Happy Sophomore Year at your University, Blaire!