Book Review: Alan I W Frank House: The Modernist Masterwork By Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer

©  2019 Alan I W Frank House Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

At the end of 2019, publishing powerhouse Rizzoli published an amazing book - a rare opportunity to explore the largest and most important house ever designed by Walter Gropius, founder of Bauhaus, and Marcel Breuer, a leading architect and furniture designer of the twentieth century - ALAN I W FRANK HOUSE: The Modernist Masterwork By Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. 

Built in 1939, and occupied in 1940 the house is a truly a masterpiece. Gropius and Breuer designed every aspect of the home built for Robert and Cecelia Frank, a third-generation of Pittsburgh industrialists, and their son, Alan. 

Some quick house details: 12,000 square feet on four floors, nine bedrooms, thirteen bathrooms, five terraces, a rooftop dance floor, an indoor swimming pool, and a cantilevered staircase of independent slab risers that Breuer would go on to make a signature of his work. To call it a house is a supreme understatement. It is more akin to a palace, mid-century style.

©  2019 Alan I W Frank House Foundation. All Rights Reserved. No image may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without prior written consent of the copyright owner.

Photo by Ezra Stoller, 1940

Robert Frank, an engineer, was very hands on in the process of the construction of the home he and his family would share. Together with his wife Cecelia, the collaboration of designer/architect/homeowner resulted in a beautiful home filled with extremely advanced systems. They incorporated an integral system for cleaning air, and an energy conservation system using the water from the indoor swimming pool as part of the heating and cooling system of the home. 

©  2019 Alan I W Frank House Foundation. All Rights Reserved. No image may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without prior written consent of the copyright owner.

Photo by Ezra Stoller, 1940

What is most fascinating though, is that the home remains essentially the same today as it was when it was first built, an unrivaled example of mid-century architecture and design. This is in large part due to Alan Frank, the son of the inspired creators of the home. Alan has preserved the house for more than 50-years, and is the current president of the Alan I W Frank House Foundation, whose mission is to preserve this unique asset in architectural and national history for the education and delight of future generations and to give them a place to connect directly with the work of the master designers who created the look and feel of modern life.  

©  2019 Alan I W Frank House Foundation. All Rights Reserved. No image may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without prior written consent of the copyright owner.

Photo by Ezra Stoller, 1940

If so inclined, you may purchase the book via the link below, or on the Alan I W Frank website where you can learn more about the foundation, the book, the house and the incredible visionaries who turned paper and plans into one of the world's most impressive examples of mid-century architecture. 

Sarah Bartholomew Design in Connecticut

Interior Design by Sara Bartholomew, Photo by Melanie Acevedo 

A few days ago, this photo of a recent project interior designer Sarah Bartholomew completed in Connecticut was published on instagram. It is one photo featured in the newest book by Carl Dellatore, titled "On Style" by Rizzoli.

I loved this, and dug around a little more to see if I could find any other pictures of the space, and while not currently available on her website, there are a few photos (both finished and in progress) available on her instagram: 

Interior Design by Sara Bartholomew, Photo by Melanie Acevedo 

An avid real estate junky, I actually know this house. 

BEFORE

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER 

BEFORE

AFTER

This photo shows that the walls are covered in beautiful Iksel Decorative Arts paper. 

AFTER

Showing the cabinetry adorned with hand-painted plates from Milan, the Iksel paper, and Les Indiennes curtains. 

BEFORE

AFTER

A small vignette that was shared from the photo shoot, Soane Britain slipper chairs in a Mark D. Sikes for Schumacher fabric. Unfortunately, the rest of the photos of the house seem to be held pretty close to the belt, probably being shopped to magazines for publishing. Here's what we do know though. 

The estate was purchased in 2017, and the family who purchased it quickly had Sarah hop on board. They're prior home was not far away, and they've opted to rent the house rather than sell. The didn't work with a decorator on that home, or any other that they've had it seems. 

I wonder what you all think of the transformation thus far? Personally, I find the custom plates on the recess of those pantry doors in the formal dining room to be a  GENIUS way to deal with that expanse of paneling. More of the house, including this living room is featured in the book, and available in the preview on amazon, here: 

Ralph Lauren Home's Sonoma Valley

Recently Ralph Lauren Home dropped the photos of their 2019 Spring Collection titled "Sonoma Valley" and it's beautiful, as usual.

via

As I looked over the images, I became engrossed - not in the decor - but in the house. I'd seen it before, but where? I toggled through the pictures on the RLH website, but most of the images were close ups of products. It was the living room that haunted me anyway, that feeling that I'd seen in all before, just better? 

And better? 

I mean, this is beautiful. 

Does it get better? 

via

Yes, yes it does.

The house had been featured in Architectural Digest, the decade long creation of architect Bobby McAlpine and interior designer Rela Gleason on a hillside in Calistoga, California overlooking the Sonoma Valley.

The good folks over at RL aren't the only ones who've used the house for catalog shoots. The house is a whopping 9,000 square feet in total, but nearly all of the catalog photos were taken in the living room. 

Pottery Barn used the room for their own spring shoot. Notice the nook? The piano sits in this bay of windows in the RL ad. 

A part-time residence, the house has been offered for scout, and was even put on the market in 2016. The listing was removed, then relisted in 2018 with a new lower price of $17 Million. Those photos are what I wanted to share with you today, since the house is so lovely and current thanks to the RLH shoot. Sit back, grab some coffee and let's take a virtual tour: 

I mean, wow - right? McAlpine knocked it out of the park with this gorgeous house, set perfectly to take in all the perfect views. And Rela decorated it beautifully.

If you're interested in learning more about McAlpine homes, they've got two books I highly recommend!

Book Review: Veere Grenney: A Point of View: On Decorating

Veere Grenney is a master of creating timeless, classic rooms with a decidedly English point of view. An AD100 designer with thirty years of experience in creating jaw dropping rooms, A Point of View is a gorgeous tome of Grenney's decorating work from across the globe.

You're no stranger to the blog, so you already know that I love interior design books. But I am a huge fan of two types of interior design books in particular: those that feature one house from cover to cover; and those that separate the photos in the book by room. Grenney organizes the entire book by room, with a room-by-room decorating philosophy for every space from entrances to kitchens.

Let's take a look at some of the lovely:

All photos copyright David Oliver for Veere Grenney: A Point of View: On Decorating 

published by Rizzoli

A master of balance, Grenney's spaces always have just enough. They seem edited to perfection, streamlined and still glamorous. More than beautiful pictures though, the book is a great read. Informational and entertaining, Grenney shares his own story of coming to know and love design through the struggles of starting his own firm, renovations, and gathering inspiration from iconic interior designers like David Hicks.

I highly encourage interior design lovers and Anglophiles like me to take a closer look at this book, and the comfortably wonderful world of Veere Grenney, where granduer and modesty reside side by side. You won't regret it!

Mark D. Sikes' New Book

Those of you who know me, or who read this blog with any regularity know that I'm a huge fan of designer, Mark D. Sikes. The love affair started when his Hollywood Hills home was featured in House Beautiful in 2012.

And I wasn't the only one who quickly became enamored with Mark's work. Pictures from Mark's feature flooded the internet. They were on every pinterest page and every blog around the country. Everyone wanted the casually elegant house Mark and his partner Michael had built for themselves and their French Bulldog Lily. Is there anyone who doesn't remember seeing this picture of his Gracie wallpapered dining room 100,000 times? 

Over the next couple of years, Mark's name became synonymous with classic, sophisticated, effortless interior design. Between his feature in House Beautiful in 2012 and today, Mark's work has been featured in more than 20 magazines, on countless blogs (including mine), and in his first book aptly titled Beautiful. Here are a few examples of his work that I cling to for inspiration: 

Always busy, Mark has somehow figured out a way to build a popular women's clothing line, design an enormously successful furniture and accessories collection for Henredon, a rug collection for Merida, a rattan and wicker collection for British manufacturer Soane, and a fabric line for Schumacher, all while working on client projects, keeping up an impressive blog and instagram presence, traveling around the country on book tours and making time for Lily, Michael, and yoga. His seemingly endless amount of energy, talent, and inspired ideas left me wondering when we would see a second book from Mark ... and it appears that it's not too far down the pike.

If you follow Mark on instagram (and if you don't you should!) you've already seen the incredible photos of the Coastal Living Magazine Idea House he was chosen to decorate in Newport, Rhode Island. Over the last few days he's been hard at work with his team, finishing off these incredible rooms both inside and out. 

Here in the boys room, Mark hashtags his photographer Amy Neunsinger and "Book2" along with "coming soon". Mark's first book, Beautiful: All-American Decorating and Timeless Style was published by Rizzoli in September 2016, less than one-year ago, and is already in it's 4th printing. It's not really a surprise that there'd be a demand for more of Mark's work cataloged on glossy pages. Hours after the sneak peek above, Mark posted this:

Gorgeous pictures of the finished Coastal Living Magazine Idea House all photographed by Amy yesterday. Could the book be just of this lovely house? I mean, it's certainly large enough to have a book all of it's own, and books about one home are hardly a new concept, Bunny Williams and Charlotte Moss are known for it.

The Coastal Living Idea House in Newport, Rhode Island is large, with 6 bedrooms and 7 bathrooms, all of which is impressively designed by Mark.

Sneak peeks of the interior rooms, which open to the public on July 1, and stay open until September 4, show amazing spaces perfectly finished in Mark's signature style. Blue abounds in every room, with glorious walls upholstered in his fabrics from Schumacher. Stripes, gingham checks, shiplap ... the entire place is nothing short of spectacular, and I'm sure was a huge task for Mark. One he should be quite proud of.

Still, most interior design books have more than 250-pages, and often times just as many if not more photos. Books like An Affair with a House are elaborated timelines of a journey with a property. The home, the garden, the parties. A book on a single new build home seems impossible. Thankfully, when it comes to other projects of Mark's since Beautiful was published, there are plenty to choose from! Mark's website lists 14 unpublished projects, including these which he's shared on his instagram.

Holiday House Hotel in Palm Springs, California:

A new beach side project in Malibu, California:

A project in beautiful Montecito, California:

And this collaboration on a new build in Kansas City that he's working on with renowned architect, Bill Ingram: 

This collaboration came after a very successful 2016 Southern Living Showhouse, designed by Ingram with the living room decorated my Mark, featured in Beautiful. 

You'll likely remember that I went on and on and on about this room. I still think it's one of the most beautiful rooms I've ever seen, and I could easily take up residence tomorrow. (Although that's clearly no longer an option!) 

So what do the Mark D. Sikes fans want the new book to look like? Beautiful was purposely designed to be a smaller book, so that it could sit on the top of other books on a coffee table or shelf. Will the new book be a larger format printing? Something similar to Bunny Williams' Point of View or Hut Wilkinson's More is More? 

You'll have a few months to ponder on it I'm sure, but the fact that Mark has so openly shared that there will be a second book is enough to have me pushing things around to make space! If you haven't picked up your own copy of his first book, Beautiful you can look at my review of the book here and pick up your copy of the book via the Amazon link below: