27 February 2010

It's Snover!


Today is is the last of my snoeuvre.


If, and I'm beginning to think WHEN, it snows on the 4th of July, I will write about it.



At one point, the icicles reached to the ground!


Disgusted by the weather, Kitty Carlisle decided enough was enough...



...and tried to make a break for it. "Look, the car's packed. We have tunes, Sun-In, Tab and cat food...let's head for the beach."



The chickens were up to their roasters in snow...

...so, Teddy decided to invite them in to warm up.

It is rather beautiful, but enough.

Starting in March, we are writing about gardening!

26 February 2010

Snoverload had become Snoverkill



Enough!




Stop!


March is Monday!



I give up!!!



Seriously, West Virginia could have easily hosted the Winter Olympics.


I hate the Winter Olympics!!!

24 February 2010

More Mitfords


I recently did a post on the William Acton drawing of the Mitford Sisters which came from The Mitford Family Album. (I heard a rumor that there are place mats featuring these drawing. Has anyone out there on Mitford watch seen such a thing? I digress...)

little augury helped put the girls in order. Now I have found another Mitford question...

Over at Ancient Industries they posted this Nancy Mitford classic and wondered who the artist for the first edition jacket could be? Cecil Beaton, Rex Whistler and Osbert Lancaster come to mind... but



I believe it is Albert Roussel. Who is it little augury?


Today I received an e-mail from Amazon-UK filled with Mitford biographies and such.


A Life of Contrasts: The Autobiography Nancy Mitford (Vintage Lives) Hons and Rebels Diana Mosley
Nancy Mitford The House of Mitford The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family


Then, Megan Wilson at My Book Covers (also Ancient Industries) posted several Mitford covers.


Both Pigtown Design and Mrs. Trefusis Takes A Taxi went gaga over the new Lab Partners covers for the Penguin UK re-issues of Nancy Mitford's novels.






Well, I just can't take much more. Well of course I can.... We do love those pesky Mitfords.

18 February 2010

Snow Angles

Kitty Carlisle Makes Snow Angels


Or "snow angles" as they are sometimes called...

February 14 -- Valentine's Day




Pepe and I


fellow Pisces and hopeless romantics wish you and yours an irresistible Valentine's Day.

February 13 -- Beverly's Birthday


HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEVERLY

My BFF, Beverly, had a birthday. She is a bit older than the above picture but still on the war path. Here's to many, many more....

15 February 2010

Brothers

Salvador Dali by George Platt Lynes

As you know, I am an unrepentant only child. Siblings simply never occur to me. That is why blogs are such wonderful little creatures. I received a note from one of my favorite bloggers, The Down East Dilettante, who reminded me that Russell Lynes had a rather famous brother, the photographer, George Platt Lynes.


I think it was this George Platt Lynes that made me think of the Alexander McQueen photo by Kin Ho, framed below the antlers.

Being very bookish, I have two suggestion for delightfully interesting books about George Platt Lynes. Each of these books are bio's-à-trois.

First there is Daved Leddick's Intimate Companions: A Triography of George Platt Lynes, Paul Cadmus, Lincoln Kirstein, and Their Circle.


The other is When We Were Three: Travel Albums of George Platt Lynes, Monroe Wheeler and Glenway Wescot by Anatole Pohorilenko and James Crump.


Thanks again to The Down East Dilettante for the watchful eye.

12 February 2010

Russell Lynes Famous "Brows"


I am a completest. This can be a good thing or a bad thing. If I like a singer, I want EVERYTHING they ever sang, every band they ever played with, every track they sang back-up on. Books are the same way. I read something I like, something that peaks my interest and I want to read EVERYTHING that author wrote. It is a sickness, I know.

This leads me to Russell Lynes. Lynes came to prominence with an article he wrote for Harper‘s Magazine. entitled, “Highbrow, Lowbrow, Middlebrow”. It caused a sensation. In the 1940’s society was not willing to admit to such strong delineations in culture. Russell Lynes ran with it.


He followed up his article with a humorous book called Snobs. It is the genre of book I am drawn to, a look at the changing role etiquette plays in everyday life. It looks at snobs. I love snobs or should I say, I love the way snobbery takes place in our lives and popular culture. Russell Lynes held the same sort of interest.

“You may not be a Snob, but your best friend probably detests a certain species of Snob, and your worst enemy certainly is one.”
There are regional Snobs, moral Snobs, sensual Snobs, political Snobs, emotional Snobs, taste Snobs, occupational Snobs and reverse Snobs. Lynes reminds us,
“In the days when Ward McAllister was arbiter of Newport society there were precisely four hundred souls in New York worth knowing and only “nobodies” lived west of the Alleghenies.”
As for the life of a regional Snob, it is said that a boy who lived on Martha’s Vineyard was asked to write an essay on a famous dictator. His paper began, “Mussolini is an off-islander.”

The sensual Snob drinks his whiskey bonded.
The car Snob would prefer and old Rolls than a new Chevy.
You get the idea.



Lynes moved from Snobs to Guests in his second book. There are multiple cites for that old adage about fish and guests stinking after three days.
“If you have a house on an upland meadow, or a cottage by the sea, or a cabin in the woods, you are likely to discover by the middle of June that the precious relaxation which w you have waited out the winter to enjoy is a mirage. The weekends during which you intent to commune with nature and your family are booked solid with weekend guests until after Labor Day.”

He reminds us that the best thing about a weekend is just that … it ends.



While Lynes was a master at the humorous little tomes about etiquette, he was also a scholar. His major work, The Domesticated Americans is a survey of how Americans live within their homes. He looks at the evolution and fashion of architecture.



How have our past times have evolved?

How did the literature about home keeping morph into the modern cookbook, etiquette references and sex manuals?

How did he veranda give way to the porch and the porch into and outdoor room unto itself?




How did bedroom furniture progress from the nineteenth century to the modern day?

Lynes tackles these questions and many more with his refined humor and eye for detail. This is the perfect book for the designer’s library.

I might have passed over The Domesticated Americans if it hadn’t been for that slim volume on Snobs that led to my catty desire to read about Guests that finally reveled a brilliant and informative cultural history. And don't forget his book, The Tastemakers, which reprints his article “Highbrow, Lowbrow, Middlebrow". So being a completest is a good thing. I believe I am still missing a Russell Lynes or two. I guarantee you, if I see one of his books, I will indeed purchase it.

11 February 2010

Requiescat in Pace - Alexander McQueen


Fellow Pisces and all around bad boy, Alexander McQueen died. It is too, dreary for such sad news. Even during the darkest days, McQueen could bring a smile.


10 February 2010

ICE, ICE Baby


I know the weather seems to be what everyone is blogging about. But seriously, I am trapped. I have no internet at the house, so I trekked out to my office where there is no heat. So, I'm going home. I'll blog again in the Spring...

08 February 2010

Those Mitford Girls, Again

Desmond Guinness' hallway to the drawing room featuring the William Acton portrait of his mother, Diana


Has the snow stranded everyone? I have been bereft without my blogs.

As for "Pin The Name On The Mitfords" little augury has posted what she believes to be the answers to the Mitford Who's Who?

Here is her list:

1 - Deborah
2 -Jessica
3- Unity
4-Pamela
5-Nancy
6- Diana

She is sure of 5 and 6. I am sure of 2. Any other ideas? Check this Lucindaville post to see the originals.

05 February 2010

Those Mitford Girls & William Acton













William Acton, the artist and brother of the famous aesthete, Harold Acton was a close friend of Diana Mitford. He sketched a lovely portrait of her. Her mother saw it and was so smitten, she commissioned Acton to draw the five remaining "Mitford Girls." I have never seen these drawing identified, so I am not real sure which is which. I believe, because of the difference in shading, the first is Diana. Acton did a famous painting of Diana and this looks like the sketch of that painting. Jessica is next and quite discernible. After that I am frankly lost.

Let's play "Pin The Name On The Mitfords." Please join in and let us know if you have ideas.


In 1985, only four of the "Mitford Girls" remained. Three of the sisters posed for portraits.

Pamela

Diana

Deborah


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