You Say “Solarium”, I Just Say “Office”

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I was telling a friend yesterday that Frances Elkins and I have been having an on-going tete-a-tete about my office.  Ms. Elkins used her solarium as her home office as well, and she sat overlooking the walled garden that her brother, David Adler, designed for her.

My office is three walls of windows very similar to this, though they go nearly to the floor.  I was telling Ms. Elkins that I did not care for the style of the mullions on my windows; they are a bit arts and crafts for my taste and don’t relate to the house in any way.  She paused before pointing out that they are exactly the same as her windows, though hers had a further flourish.  This reassured me a bit as she knew it would.

In the spirit of solidarity I ordered a new white bamboo desk chair.  (She did not have white bamboo here, but I was sure that she would approve.)  It was happily in place when Bill came home from work.  “Is that comfortable?” he asked taking in the criss-crossed lattice of the back.  I stared back blankly and he nodded, “Never mind.”

He thinks it would be a fine idea, however, to buy a day bed to go underneath the windows on the long wall opposite my desk.  “You could read a book there.  Or nap.”  This made me wonder how he thinks I spend my day, but rather than take the bait I noted, “The only beings that would sleep there would be Dexter and Rosie.” “Well, that would be ok, wouldn’t it?”  It would, actually, as it would provide an excuse to hunt down two rope lamps to flank it.

I can feel my work improving already.

(By the way, if you think there is any chance that I could get the boys to say “solarium,” you are delusional.  I can’t even get them to say “sofa” though they have never heard me utter the word “couch.”  I blame the media.)

Image from Frances Elkins Interior Design, Stephen M. Salny, W.W. Norton & Co. 2005.

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Look Into My Eyes

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 “I want you to use the Retin A on your forehead every day.”

I stared back at my dermatologist and tried to decipher just what she was saying.  She’s equal parts clinical and personal, and I like her not just for her flawless skin which gives me hope.

“Oh.  Yes, well, the forehead isn’t really the problem, it’s my eyes.”

She arched one perfectly drawn brow in response.

“Yes, actually I’ve seen a plastic surgeon about it.  My eyelids are so heavy that unconsciously I am raising my eyebrows in order to lift them off of my lashes.  That’s what is causing the wrinkles.”

“It’s significant enough that I think your insurance might cover it.  You should check with your optometrist.”

Cut to a clandestine meeting in a neighborhood coffee shop where a friend said, “She could be right.  I think you should make an appointment.”  Neither woman said the word, “bad” as in “bad enough to be covered by insurance as your eyelids have dropped to the point that they are impeding your peripheral vision.”  But that is the case.

It’s not a surprise, really.  If you saw my father’s eyelids you would see where this is headed.  Still, as I stood in the kitchen and explained the stitches and the bruising to Bill he said, “Please don’t do it.”  I just can’t tell what would take more courage; the scalpel and the slice or the slow slide.

Living elegantly with a little wear was Princess Claude Ruspoli in, yes, Paris.  She was quite fond of antique fabrics, the patina of which adds to the allure of her apartment overlooking the Seine.  Architectural Digest, International Interiors, 1979; photography Pascal Hinous.

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A Happy Book

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And so we are off.  The boys are back at school and I am home again in the quite with only the rustle and woofing of the dogs to disturb me.

I received an email, the subject line of which was “Be Well in 2012” and I originally thought the sender was “The Universe.” Ominous, once opened it turned out to be from The University of Kansas.  Nice, but less profound.

I could use a little profundity as I have had a few projects come to an end and rather than feeling relieved, I feel adrift.  Two volunteer projects sit on my desk like bags of snakes.  They twist and curl, slither and hiss just here at my left elbow; I keep thinking I have their sacks firmly tied, but they make me anxious just the same.

And, our new year feels more like mourning than morning.  Over the holidays we were seeped in death, dipped again and again and again.  It did not diminish the joy of the carols, but often made them seem a little too loud.

As joyous as the season is, and as much as it touts beginnings, it is the end of things as well.

To shake off the snakes and escape the gloom of my musings, I set out to see the world.  A great find came, as great finds often do, on a dusty shelf in a thrift shop.  It was waiting there for me, without its wrap (and not needing one as our weather has been fine), knowing that I would find it and its meaning in good time.

Ludwig Bemelmans’s The Best of Times is a compilation of his articles for Holiday magazine recounting his travels through Europe following World War II.  Mr. Bemelmans took his title from Dickens, and, indeed, it is not always a rosy view.  But to me it said, “Go.  Don’t wait.  You never know.”

All images by Ludwig Bemelmans from The Best of Times, Simon and Schuster, 1948.  The title is taken from the introduction.  “I set out to write a happy book.  The mood was somber, then as it is now, but I disagreed with the opinion that was screamed at us from the radio and the front pages…”

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A Modern Man

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When one of our friends told us he was gay I said, “I would be so disappointed if one of the boys…” and before I could finish he said, “was gay.”  “No. Was gay and felt like he couldn’t tell me.”

Ten years later what strikes me is that there is a need for any telling at all.  That the gender of the person to whom you are attracted is news.

Born in 1922, interior designer Melvin Dwork, grew up in Kansas City.  I have no idea if there was a discussion or not, but he notes that his family took his homosexuality in stride.  This is remarkable not only for its day, but for this city where coming out stories of forty and fifty year old married men are not uncommon even now.

As a few local designers have done, he loved the Nelson, attended the Kansas City Art Institute and furthered his design education at Parsons.  He enlisted for service in the U.S. Navy’s Hospital Corp during WWII.

Upon suspicion of his homosexuality, the Navy confined Dwork to the Brig for a month, breaking his confinement only for interrogation and psychoanalysis.  The Navy eventually released Dwork from service with an undesirable discharge.  He returned to New York and Parsons allowed him to attend on scholarship.

Seventy years later, after decades of work, the Pentagon changed the status of his discharge from undesirable to honorable and reinstated his benefits.

Filmmaker, Mike Jacoby, is making The Undesirable, a film of Dwork’s story.  Much work has been done, but they are still raising money to complete the production.  I have made a small donation and I am inviting you to donate, too.

Dwork has had a successful and celebrated career in design.  His work has been featured in nearly every major shelter magazine and the New York Times.  He has been a member of the AD100 and Interior Design magazine’s Hall of Fame.  That should be his story.  Being persecuted for being gay shouldn’t be anyone’s story.  If we tell these stories enough, maybe they won’t be.

More information on The Undesirable, here.  To donate, here.  And, my latest piece in Spaces KC profiling Dwork is here.

Top two images from House & Garden, next, via Blue Remembered Hills, the New York Times image of Dwork’s apartment follows, then one from The Peak of Chic.  

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