The Bunny Effect

"I don't want to hear one more word about that sale," said my friend's partner upon hearing our topic of conversation.  Indeed the Bunny Mellon auction is STILL a subject of conversation - mainly what we didn't win - and has unleashed a passion in many of us for ceramic vegetables and painted fauteuils (a market on which Mrs. Mellon seemed to have a monopoly).

If you viewed the sale, you couldn't have missed the ginormous five-tier etagere arranged with all manner of porcelain cabbage, asparagus, and lettuce, faithfully replicating how it was in her Virginia house*, as seen above.

One of the many interesting things about Mrs. Mellon is that even though she could have lived in the most ducal surroundings, she preferred things rustic and light.  She wasn't afraid to paint a bronze Giacometti white or let it rust out in the garden, and she didn't think twice about whopping off the Chippendale Gothic cresting...

of that etagere, which she purchased from Colefax and Fowler, as seen in this 1964 photo that John Fowler sent Mario Buatta.

* Not the Georgian style red brick house her husband built with his first wife.  Apparently it was too formal and stiff for the 2nd Mrs. Mellon who used it instead as a walk-in closet.

Inside Nancy Lancaster's Yellow Room… London Diary, Part II

Like Mario and doubtless many others since, I've pored over photos of The Yellow Room so many times that it has become an old and familiar friend.  Yet unfathomably I had never stepped foot into Avery Row until this trip.

The exterior of 39 Brook Street.  Read Mario's book on how he first encountered John Fowler outside the shop in the 1960s… It is a charming tale of twin pocket squares out of Plautus.

Mario, Maureen and I were Colefax & Fowler's guests at Claridge's for lunch, a mere 20 paces away.  I had a glass of sauvignon blanc with the lobster bisque, served in a spa-like portion and fortunately augmented by spring peas ordered for the table.  I must admit the tremendous enthusiasm and anticipation my companions showed for these peas did arch an eyebrow, but after one spoonful, I am a now a devotee.  There may be nothing better than fresh English peas (rolled around in butter and basil I believe and al dente).  And if there is one other hot tip you must take away from this blog, it is to never miss going to the loo in a smart hotel or restaurant.  Claridge's ladies' powder room is mint green and black Deco deliciousness.  

C&F: the front room on the ground floor with green walls complemented by Mario's socks; Harry, an adorable young man who works there, is hiding in the window to the right

After cappuccino and an affogato for Mario who is a dessert-hound (he would alway brings cookies to our meetings.  Once, after we discovered a mutual passion for peanut butter-chocolate ice cream, he brought a pint of chocolate and a jar of Skippy as the grocery store didn't have this flavor of the gods in stock), we embarked on our short journey to C&F.

The wall paper inspired by the Anteroom of Drottningholm Palace Theater in Sweden, below

For those who haven't yet made their first pilgrimage, the shop is composed of a rabbit's warren of rooms, rambling from one to another. 

The back of the building looks out onto this courtyard garden.  C&F's archivist Barrie McIntyre, who is  an incredible repository of information and a jewel in the firm's crown, shared that Mrs. Lancaster was furious with Mr. Fowler when the walls (barely discernible now under the ivy) were painted and the two rowed for weeks.

On the first floor (or our second floor) one goes through this small room before entering the barrel-vaulted double-height Yellow Room.  Barrie told us that Mrs. Lancaster purchased the large old master painting (to the right) for the frame.  She then had the canvas cut up and applied to the walls and closet doors.

Even though the room is no longer  furnished with Mrs. Lancaster's antiques (Mario calls the room "a scrapbook of her life") it is still lyrical.

 The money shot: a close up of the glazed "egg yolk" walls

The faux marbre baseboards

At the far end of the room is a pair of double doors that open to this practical small butler's pantry complete with dumbwaiter

The bay windows are deep and conceal these closets

BEFORE: The room in 1947 (which I included in Regency Redux)

It was originally designed by Sir Jeffry Wyattville, George IV's architect, who most notably made extensive alterations to Windor Castle between 1824–1828

AFTER: In 1957, Nancy Lancaster moved into the set of rooms above the shop to economize. This photograph by James Mortimer shows it in 1982.

Reading list: John Cornforth, The Inspiration of the Past

Part III: Vita Sackville-West & Sissinghurst

Fowler Pink?: The Kelmarsh Hall Conundrum

Interpreting an historical house is a fascinating process. Peeling back the layers and indeed deciding which layers to peel can be difficult and sometimes controversial.

Marianne Suhr, Surveyor of the Fabric at Kelmarsh Hall, wrote about a dilemma she and her colleagues recently faced in her paper "John Fowler and Nancy Lancaster at Kelmarsh Hall" published in John Fowler: The Invention of the Country House Style (Donhead, 2005).

Kelmarsh was designed by the important Palladian architect James Gibbs in the early eighteenth century in Northamptonshire. Architecture historian Nicolas Pevsner judged it“a perfect, extremely reticent design…done in an impeccable taste.”

However, Kelmarsh is best known as the house where Nancy Lancaster first established her taste in decorating. She and first husband Ronnie Tree came to the house in 1928 with the agreement to redecorate the Hall in lieu of paying rent. Upon arriving, the Trees found the Entrance Hall "a dark, rather sad green" which Nancy soon had painted over "an Italian pink, a light terracotta" which she copied from Lady Islington, "the person in England who had the very taste and the very best color sense." This pink, which became know locally as Kelmarsh pink, was much admired and copied by her neighbors. She complemented the pink with "two chairs covered in the most wonderful tangerine velvet, another in emerald green, one Queen Anne wing chair in bright yellow brocade and a chair and sofa in striped fabric I bought in Italy."

The current custodians of Kelmarsh realize the importance of Nancy Lancaster's contribution to 20th century decoration and decided to keep the Entrance Hall as a document of her early taste. However, the famous pink walls were flaking, which in fact had always proved to be a problem as the walls were originally of a burnished plaster mixed with marble dust and not meant to be painted. This condition meant that as soon as 1950 Nancy's pink walls needed to be refreshed. Enter John Fowler.

This is where things get sticky. In 1950, Nancy and 2nd husband Colonel Lancaster (the owner of Kelmarsh!) were divorcing, and furthermore she and Fowler were on the outs. Fowler who was entrusted with the project sent his color mixer Horace to work with a local firm, and came but once to inspect the project. According to a painter who was on the scene at the time, no effort was made to match the original pink.

Now that the walls are flaking again, do you take the color back to 1928 even if there's no guarantee that you can capture it but that is truer to the overall interpretation of the room, or do you conserve the Fowler pink and think of it as part of the room's history?

In the end, Kelmarsh decided to redecorate the lower half of the walls to 1950, and then to leave the paint above "with all its archeology."

What do you think?