stop stringing me along

darling! look it's a tole string holder, just in time for- something. here at One Kings Lane.

let Nature take its course

 Nature comes in different guises and bringing Nature INside & making it into something functional is part of Man's better Nature. All of these things are a part of my One Kings Lane Tastemaker Tag Sale-each one has a story-and each has captured my attention and is part of my personal collection or was selected by me expressly for the Sale.

 top to bottom 

Glazed pottery vase with raised floral decorations. This piece is one I have used for early spring cherry blossoms or pink forsythia branches. It always brings an exotic air to the room. Stands 9" high.

 Three yards of Lee Jofa Verdure Tapestry fabric. Through masses of leaves tree trunks can be seen-creating a rich forest to recover a chair. I've used this length to cover a table just as it is-with no extra seaming or tacking.


Drawn to Gestures-I have a number of  "Hands" carved in wood-made of porcelain-perhaps once a part of a Santos-or anything that speaks quietly of the perfect gesture. This is a single HAND Carved in Wood that may have been a glove mold. Its primitive execution makes it sculptural and its height makes it ideal sitting on a coffee table amongst or on top of stacks of books. 15 inches tall.


This Primitive Hand Carved Garden Turtle had a spot in a garden for many years- I wonder where? I've collected turtles for years and this giant caught my eye-how could it not? Measures 20 inches long and 12 inches wide.


Each piece is linked within the text to a description page on One Kings Lane, or you can see everything HERE.

The Sale is going great, lots of pieces are gone-but some of my favorites remain. I'm personally overseeing the packing of the Sold pieces so everything except the White Glove items (those taking special shipping requirements)- will be on their way for Holiday gift giving.

Thanks for looking-and making this a great Sale- pgt

a little more at One Kings Lane

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My Tastemaker Tag Sale at One Kings Lane starts November 29th and as I mentioned yesterday- there are Lots of textiles and prints and some special Christmas ornaments from Germany; 2 huge kugels and 2 collections of Kunstlerschutz animals from the 1960's. There are also great looking things for the desk and vanity.
Think Christmas!

I've featured a couple of things to Peek at in advance of the Sale. Let me know what you think.

This is a beautiful silk skirt from China. In past, I've used it to cover a skirted table during the holidays, folding over the printed waist to cover a portion of the top.

Vintage Chinese Silk Skirt with pink green turquoise embroidery of birds, f lowers, mountains, decorative panels of trim and a cotton print waist.

Of course there are some books in the Sale-not as many as you might expect-but this one is quite unique.Vintage Dr. Minder's Anatomical Manikin Of The Female Body Book. Edited by Wm. S. Furneaux & Revised by Dr. Ethel Mayer.

The Sale goes LIVE tomorrow. See you there. PGT

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the parasol-at One Kings Lane

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& the umbrella.

& how it's used-

photograph from my collection

  Tissot often included them in his paintings.

 in art-we see the parasol-the umbrella,
& this Thursday, November 29- a few of my own favorites will be offered at my Fall One Kings Lane Tastemaker Tag Sale. There are loads of  textiles, prints and things for the house too.

This large canvas by Frederick Carl Frieseke hangs in the North Carolina Museum of Art, maybe that's where it all started.

The Garden Parasol, c.1910.

This is a turn of the century English parasol-the deep wine silk band almost a purple- attracted me to it along with the fine stitching of the band to the body of the cream silk.

Fashion photographers and stylists have been inspired by them for centuries.

Ervin Blumenfeld, 1954

Karl Lagerfeld for CHANEL,2011

a little augury series of parasols I call Sunscreen can be seen here.

join me Thursday-here

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la belle Hélène & a Balthus: "presque fée"

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from Christie's auction in late September the sale of  Hélène Rochas' personal property caught my attention. How could one miss this?

 image from Christie's

"presque fée"

 “almost a fairy.” -Paul Éluard (referring to Hélène)

  Balthus' painting- Japonaise a la table rouge. 

 the model-Setsuko Ideta-the painter’s wife

 the painting fetched $2,974,075

This Balthus painting is one I've long favoured and admired-that takes in a great deal-and there are a number of his paintings I am drawn to. I recently read the Balthus memoir-Vanished Splendors as told to Alan Vircondolet. Like most memoirs-it gives us what one wants seen-but for me-this is ideal. It gives up Balthus as he saw himself. Let others think what they will about us-I say.

The  painting reflects the apartment-an exquisite craving - a passionate torture-slaked with the pale coolness of white.That pale- punctuated by a fog of grey and blush following strict lines controlling a cinched feminine bow.

About the paintings- and the woman that owned them?

this Warhol portrait of Mme.fetched $233,539.

Hélène Rochas, wife of Marcel Rochas-heir to the ROCHAS fashion fortune-had exquisite taste-her husband's. Only 18 when the pair married, Hélène was just 30 when ROCHAS died suddenly. It was Marcel Rochas-along with decorator George Geoffrey who set the apartment in motion and upon his death in 1955-she continued to define it-refine it and establish her own decorating style. Their daughter Sophie explains of her father in WWD, “He was an artist to his fingertips, which meant he decided what my mother wore, the tablecloths, the menus, the porcelain. He was omnipresent — probably too much so, even."

“A new style was created, and it was truly a revelation. I would even say it was a revolution in taste.” Hubert de Givenchy

a young Hélène juxtaposed with a Wassily painting from her collection, "Brown Silence" that sold for $2,753,952.

 “It’s a form of taste that has practically died out, in which styles and eras are brought together with elegance and sobriety. The walls are white, the curtains are plain and what stands out is the beauty of the artworks,I think it’s extremely Parisian.” -François de Ricqlès of Christie's on the apartment's decoration

I see it as decoration at its best.Ruhlmann and Eileen Gray pieces dominated the Music Room-set off by deep lacquered walls-a portrait by Fabio Rieti- is a standout to my mind-even beyond the Warhol.

from the Architectural Digest archives here

along with many more photographs from the apartment

Fabio Rieti portrait of Mme.

the painting sold for $9,677

Christie's image

 Mme., with sphinx on the mantle, sold for $30,644.

A few of my favourite things from the Sale, a pair of terra cotta sphinx, two handbags center,& at top r.-and a Pierre Le-Tan painting that depicts Daisy Fellowes in costume as the Queen of Africa, at the Beistegui Ball.

 another Le-Tan drawing from the auction

image from French Vogue

Madame's bedroom-with a standing mirror-as in the Balthus painting-and above the bed a portrait of her and her two young children by Lenore Fini painted in 1947.

image from my clippings

 Another view of the bedroom

 from Architectural Digest

Frédéric Mitterrand's preface for the Christie's auction reflects the sphere Madame Rochas orbited in: "Café society was taken over by the artistic dialogue present between some of man's most creative and brightest artists, and that of an unfettered woman, all of whom have since disappeared, and were in love with Hélène in their own way."

 the results

The sale brought in $20,340,905, double the auction’s presale estimate, with 95% of the 268 lots sold.

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“You need less rather than more to be elegant now,” she declared. “Being well dressed…does not mean going to a great couturier.” She continued: “In the day, practical things.... The exotic is for summer and evening.”

Read more: http://www.wmagazine.com/fashion/2008/07/helene_rochas#ixzz2DHQVXVwr

“You need less rather than more to be elegant now,” she declared. “Being well dressed…does not mean going to a great couturier.” She continued: “In the day, practical things.... The exotic is for summer and evening.”

Read more: http://www.wmagazine.com/fashion/2008/07/helene_rochas#ixzz2DHQVXVwr

Read more: http://www.wmagazine.com/fashion/2008/07/helene_rochas#ixzz2DHQVXVwr

I saw an owl today

the sun's glare on his grey feathers-
a patent gloss of armor.
a ruff of feathers-he balanced
on metal staked by the roadside.

the owl -with knowing,
witness to man's
wayward nature.
man-a blur on the road-
finessing asphalt.
oblivious-
naturally.

on this day

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there will be no banqueting.

no Gluttony.

no Stout.

no jams-

no glamour

no running all about

but guests have been arriving

(of that have little doubt)

with a place at table

I give all thanks to Them-

 (Cecil, Susan Mary, Patty, Ivan, Mercedes, Madge and Esther)

Now please say Grace

-Amen. 


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why don't you?

LIKE little augury on FACEBOOK.


I have created a Page dedicated to little augury on FACEBOOK. Join Us there for a few things you might not see here.

 there is a "badge" like the one below to click on and visit-along the right side of this post.

the Lucile EFFECT

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Dior , photograph by Ellen von Unwerth

Lucile has been celebrated- there are books about her- her autobiography- her sister's autobiography and biographies about the pair. That both were women of passion and -of their era is obvious-perhaps less so-is her enduring influence on fashion and decoration-and their intersection.

Lucile-above & sister Elinor below

The Sutherland  sisters became known as the "IT" girls-Lucile-Lady Duff Gordon and her author sister Elinor Glyn. Elsie de Wolfe (below) an indisputable IT Girl-don't-ya-know? It's no wonder they were kindred spirits in their taste and style.

They are all wearing Lucile.

Elsie de Wolfe interior, photograph by Derry Moore

Elsie and Lucile were fast friends. Influencing each other in all things. Elsie wore Lucile. Lucile decorated her salon and Elsie took note. Lucile refused to work in anything remotely resembling a practical  Fitting Room or Work Room-No, it was the Ball Room she preferred- and that set her apart in the extreme from other fashion houses. Nothing at Maison Lucile smelled of Trade.

Strictly eighteenth century in design, Louis XV chairs were covered in grey silk, pale grey walls were finessed with white frothy trim work and grey silk taffeta curtains were fashioned with silks roses by the hundreds in clusters at the windows. 
I can just see it. Lucile's radical presentation ran- with the rustle of tissue thin silk-away from Victorian decoration. This look was It-and It spilled over to her Lucile's home and to Elinor's as well. While Elinor indulged in a heavy hand, the Exotic and Romantic-her taste stemmed directly from sister Lucile's fashions and  fashion house. No doubt Elsie was duly impressed and took her cues from Lucile's decoration and style and ran away with IT. The rest is Elsie History.

from Elsie's The House in Good Taste

& Elsie's predecessors-

like Veere Grenney

& the ever elegant Suzanne Rheinstein-

“Romance is the glamour which turns the dust of everyday life into a golden haze.”-Elinor Glyn

Lady Duff Gordon-LUCILE

 Sketch for a Portrait by Philip de Laszlo

Lucile began her fashion career as Artist. This she would insist upon her entire life. She was artist-and the first gowns she designed -she called Picture Frocks. "I was an artist. Nothing more... It is a lesser form of art, I know, but to me it meant a great deal, my life's work and I was tremendously in earnest over every dress I created."

portrait of Lillie by Herbert Gustave Schmalz

Lillie Langtry- from the Isle of Jersey, as were the sisters-was model absolute to them & "Jersey Lil" was the first name to wear Lucile. Others followed-Margot Asquith, Violet, Duchess of Rutland, Lady Desborough- known as The Souls-all came to see Madame Lucile.

Lucile credits herself with allowing a Lady to be a sensual creature.
'I showed the world that a woman's leg can be a thing of beauty, instead of a "limb",which was only spoken of in the privacy of the fitting room.'

 Indeed-
and while Lucile showed  a little leg, sister Elinor was putting pen to paper to write about women who dared to show more in her novel Three Weeks (that's another story, and a glorious one too).

Moderne MOLYNEUX

It was a Captain Molyeneux that shared Lucile's taste and sense of what women wanted to wear. He was one of Lucile's many devoted coterie of men friends.While Lucile was gallivanting on the continent and the states-Molyeneux was creating designs for Lucile-with the look of Lucile but adding his own aesthetic to the final design. His skills as designer moved Lucile's Belle Epoque designs into modernity. He was extremely loyal as friend and employee but Lucile felt threatened by his successes. Molyeneux moved on-and in truth Lucile was not moving along with the times-she simply didn't want to.

Lucile (l) & Molyeneux (r).

Lucile moved Lingerie in fashion to new heights-once relegated to the boudoir and for few eyes only- Lingerie Looks were one of Lucile's signatures. Diaphanous drapery wafted through Salons and waltzed through ballrooms.

Lucile's love for the look never wavered and has been embraced by innumerable designers like Christian Lacroix

& Riccardo Tisci at Givenchy

Today Lucile's labelled has been revived by Camilla Blois her great, great, grand-daughter

Another lily-this time Lily Elsie- wore Lucile in the stage success The Merry Widow.

“…The triumph of the Merry Widow was also a personal triumph for me, for of all the plays I dressed, and there were many, it was my favourite. ‘The Merry Widow Hat,’ which I designed for Lily Elsie, brought in a fashion which carried the name of “Lucile,” its creator, all of Europe and the States. Every woman who wanted to be in the swim had to have a ‘Merry Widow Hat’, and we made thousands of pounds through the craze, which lasted longer than most fashion crazes, for the charm of the play kept it alive.”

“From that day I designed all her [Elsie’s] clothes both for the stage and in private life and some of my most successful models were created for her, for once she had ‘found herself’ she wore them so charmingly that every woman who saw them wanted to have them copied…”- Lucy Duff-Gordon

Many years later Cecil Beaton would borrow heavily from Lucile's creations for My Fair Lady.

The House Models-another first in fashion from Lucile- were handpicked and groomed to be the face of Lucile.
Lucile was the first to have fashion shows with mood and theme &
PASTEL Hair.
Surprised?

hair by Julien, photograph by Patrick Demarchelier in Vogue

(very much as I imagine Lucile's models)

GAMELA & CORISANDE

at Maison Lucile Lucile's models were schooled and their names changed to give them the sisters' IT

portrait of Saoirse Ronan by photographer Steven Meisel for Vogue

In the New York press Lucile's models were "crusaders of the Dream Dress given a mission of mercy, the great mission of spreading among New York's Four Hundred the cult of the dream dress, the wondrous product of the genius of Lady Duff Gordon."

Her apex as label Lucile came in 1909 as those Edwardians thought their languid lives would always be so. With royal onlookers-Queen Marie of Romania a favorite Lucillian- & the Queen of Spain, Lucile staged The Seven Ages of Woman with scenes from "The Hostess" having layer upon layer of Lucile dramatics-borrowed heavily from sister Elinor's character "the Lady" in Three Weeks.

Lucile's The Seven Ages of Woman

Scene A: The Desire of the Eyes:Persuasive Delight: The Whisper of early Green: Visible Harmony: A Frenzied Hour: A Garden of Sleep: Salut d'Amour: Unorthodox: An Interval: Afterwards: Contentment
(a that was just scene A)

With frocks on -we leave sister Elinor to close curtain:

She was seated on the old Venetian chair... the most radiant vision he had yet seen. Her garment was pale green gauze...clasped with pearls...the whole place had been converted into a bower of roses. A great couch of deepest red ones was at one side, fixed in such masses as to be quite resisting and firm... from the roof chains of roses hung...above the screen of lilac buses in full bloom, the moon in all her glory mingled with the rose-shaded lamps and cast a glamour and unreality over the whole. (from Three Weeks)

Lucile's power to woo the women of her era was lost to a war looming just out of her veiled vision of beauty- it was a war where losses gave way to resignation and Lucile's magic never rekindled though her seductive feminine charm remains.



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