“If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.” ―E.B. White
We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. ―T. S. Eliot
"Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful." —Norman Vincent Peale
STRANGE to be writing this message on the very last day of the year, as when many of these photos were taken, the month of December stretched out like a long and languid dream.
IN THESE LAST DAYS before Christmas, the city sidewalks are filled with last-minute shoppers, merry with the flush of cava and happy to be jostled about by the elbows and shopping bags of grandmothers with arms filled with gifts, and couples hoping to surprise one another with their thoughtfulness. Everywhere, there seems to be a feeling of good cheer.
These days have been filled with lots of dinners and parties for many Parisians. Meanwhile, there are is always some last-minute shopping and final outfit preparations for the next holiday soirée, so I gathered a few outfit ideas inspired by my clients' shopping.
FEW THINGS can conjure up the holiday spirit more than a perfectly decorated home and Ven House, the early-Georgian mansion built for a wealthy lawyer (who went bankrupt in the process) in the countryside near the Somerset village of Milborne Port, is exactly that.
We live in a world so addicted to speed and noise, I realize every day that everything we do is in such a hurry. At work I observe clients always in a hurry. On the streets (with the exception of the Rive Gauche side of Paris where time seems to stand still) there is a rythme frenetique, as the locals say.
When we first moved to Spain three years ago, one of the only things that we lamented was that around the holiday season, the city just didn't seem very festive. There was the usual carousel and a few smaller decorated trees here and there, but over all, the shops and streets never really got into the holiday spirit like they do in the UK.
“Past and Present I know well; each is a friend and sometimes an enemy to me. But it is the quiet, beckoning Future, an absolute stranger, with whom I have fallen madly in love.” —Richelle E. Goodrich
WE JUST REALISED today that it is two weeks until Christmas and all the shop windows are decorated with beribboned garlands and strings of fairy lights.
Some of us are endearingly terrible cooks but have excellent taste in food and love to eat, while there are others of us who always seem to be able to whip up the most delicious things with little notice and not much in the kitchen but a handful of staples. This Holiday Gift Guide is for them. From handblown decanters with 24k gold leaf stoppers, to white ceramic cocottes and the most beautifully engineered and exceptional knives—here is a Gift Guide for those who love to cook...
I am especially excited for Christmas this year and am fully committed to making it a holiday filled with joy for those around me and myself. For my fellow glamour hunters, I hope that this holiday and New Year’s are filled with red velvet dreams and sweet decadence.
It’s nearly December, which means the festive season is nearly here! Winter parties, glittery soirées and evening cocktails will soon fill these chilly nights.
