While everyone is talking about monograms, I thought I’d show you my favourite personalized piece – my jeans. Yes, that’s right – I have monogrammed jeans. When I was writing I Love Your Style in 2007, I wanted to include a section on monograms in my Classic chapter. I was trying to think of an unconventional way to wear one, and so I went to see my friend Eleanor Lembo, who worked at Earnest Sewn at the time, and asked if there was any way they’d sew my initials on the back right pocket of my jeans for me...
Inspired by Sofia Coppola’s excellent mini-doc of Lee Radziwill for The New York Times, I decided to revisit some old favorite “Lee” images in my archive. While I was doing some additional research to round out an homage to her, I discovered something even more pressing – pictures of her houses from the last few decades. She had many houses, from many phases of her life, during the administration of many husbands, throughout a handful of countries...
I’ve always been a fan of Bridget Riley’s paintings, but I love these photos of her standing in front of her work even more. The contrast of her simple yet chic black and white clothes against the black and white patterns in her work, the organic shape of her body against the strict, graphic nature of the designs on the canvases, and the combination of different pieces shown together at opposing angles all add a softer element that makes her work more human and relatable to me...
Would you wear a bowtie? I’m not sure if I would. I am definitely a girl who loves a bow, but I think I am more of a bow-in-my-hair type of girl. I LOVE a black git was more of the soft pussycat-bow-on-a-blouse look. Never say never, but so far the urge to wear an actual bow tie hasn’t come to me.
Despite my own resistance, I love seeing other girls in bow ties. I notice that many girls who venture out in one make a regular habit of it...
This past weekend I went to Toulouse, France and the surrounding Gers region to visit my daughter Coco who is in school there for three months. With or without a child to visit, I would repeat this weekend any time – we had fun, we relaxed, we shopped, we ate (I had foie gras 4 times!), and we saw so many beautiful things.
When we first came back to England in January, I felt that the gloomy weather might finally get to me. It was grey, wet, and dark for the good part of every day. There had been so much novelty in the fall leading up to Christmas – blackberry season, apple season, the changing of the leaves, the first frost, the first hard frost – and now I just felt like everything was dead, and that it would be a while until new life emerged...
I’m in the midst of decorating my office – a modest, but charming stone garden shed with a slate tile roof. Inside there is a wood burning stove and just enough room for a beautiful mid century rosewood desk that was a moving-to-England present from my husband, a credenza and a two-seater sofa. I’m going to hang all my old Hugo Guinness show announcements from John Derian on the walls, and I’ll cover one whole wall with tear sheets, photos and other bits and pieces of creative fuel...
I continue to obsess over the pictures of Paul and Linda McCartney and their family living on a farm in Scotland in the 70’s. How could I not? Looking over them again recently got me thinking about Fair Isle sweaters. For most of my life they were a symbol of classic New England prep school style – something that for much of my life was too close to home to be able to appreciate. Sure I had a literal stage where I myself wore Fair Isle sweaters while weaving Mexican rope bracelets and listening to the Grateful Dead, but when I moved on there was no going back...
Before moving on from the holidays, I can’t not also share with you our first family visit back to New York for New Year’s. I wasn’t sure about choosing New York as our vacation at first. I really wanted to relax after the bustle of a full on English Christmas, and I knew NYC would be loads of fun, but would it be relaxing?? My answer came when our friend Miranda asked us to house sit in Brooklyn while she and her family went off to Colorado...
