Veranda July/August 2022

DURING THE DARKEST, dreariest months of the year when I find myself longing for summer, a certain place always comes to mind. It’s a specific place, a lake house from my childhood, but what takes shape in my daydreams is imprecise, sculpted from sensory impressions. There’s the creak of the twin spindle beds my sister and I shared, the cicadas’ strange lullaby drowned out by the steady hum of a ceiling fan. Then there’s the crunch of gravel under a tire gently announcing the arrival of a guest and the seductive scent of burgers on the grill. What does the house look like? It hardly matters in my memories. Which isn’t to say the house didn’t have a decorating point of view. Quite the opposite, in fact. Especially because it never…

Electrifying Neoclassicism Leave it to cardinal red to loosen up even the most monumental forms. Irwin and Lane’s soaring Tekhenu bookcase channels designer Matthew Zwissler’s fascination with the architecture of ancient Egypt. Its tapered top shelf upends the rectilinear norm, but it’s the étagère’s spirited hue that lends modern levity—a commanding red that would have charmed even Giza’s most stoic rulers. chairish.com Campaign Couture Reborn Call it the 19th-century equivalent of glamping—Napoleon Bonaparte’s dapper field tents and parlor furniture that popped up well behind battle lines. With pleated skirting and cornflower blue welting, Mark D. Sikes’s Magnolia armless chair (Chaddock) pairs with an indigo and madder toile for a modern empirical throne. Decadent wall stripes descend like the most enviable tenting. chaddockhome.com Old-School Gallic Gaiety Never a dull moment at the French rustic table: a…

AMY JOHNSON AND JULIE LAWRENCE admit there’s a hidden pun in Pared, their newly launched collection of custom-designed, handmade tole sconces. The pair have been friends since age 11, but it’s a paring down of the fussier, often historical sconce archetype that defines its reinvention. Regency-era tole obsessives, Johnson and Lawrence took form inspiration from objets d’art such as antique pen trays and papier-mâché coasters. Not meant as reproductions, says Lawrence, “the sconces’ arms don’t have the detailing or turns that you’d find in an antique piece. The back plates are hidden; you don’t see the screws.” Adds Johnson: “We wanted to let those paint colors, waxes, and gilding take center stage.” Indeed, an exuberant, if long overdue, return to the limelight for tole.…

Light, Luminous Patchwork A shining moment for folk art arrives in the Korean craft tradition of Bojagi, which turns scraps of varying provenance and pattern into wrapping cloths for gifts, food, even religious shrines. Today’s iterations unite a medley of sheer fabrics—think semitranslucent stripes, Oriental blossoms, and slubby solids—with French seams for humble panels that, in sunlit corridors, feel like blousy, tactile takes on stained glass windows. Cool Summer Canopies Like sun-dappled foliage, flowering branches embroidered on diaphanous linen offer a dreamy canopy for midday repose (here, draping a French Provincial–style daybed by Doorman). Sheer slipcovers soften garden seating, dressing bamboo and ironwork in gauzy feminine gowns. Inside These Garden Walls… …the late afternoon sun shines on an intimate dinnertime tableau. Inspired by Japanese rice paper screens, folding partitions fitted with sheer or semisheer panels—here,…

Desert Majesty Call it the eighth wonder of the world: With its orange spessartites, purple and pink sapphires, and white diamonds, Harry Winston’s Grand Canyon necklace draws upon the late-day luminosity of America’s most monumental bit of geology, the Grand Canyon. Like a breathtaking postcard writ sublime, the necklace is part of the maison’s Majestic Escapes collection, capturing the magic not just of place but also of time: a moment when the sun glides across the sky and the terrain transforms from orange to pink in a shimmering blink of an eye. Earth, Wind & Flower The blow-in-the-breeze ephemerality of the dandelion achieves radiant glory in diamonds. Tiffany & Co.’s Dandelion necklace—a round brilliant diamond of more than 12 carats with mixed-cut diamonds of more than 85 total carats—recalls Louis Comfort Tiffany’s love…

AFTER NEARLY A CENTURY of teasing aficionados with its enticing scarcity, the insouciant salmon wristwatch is having—yes—a moment. And the moment couldn’t come soon enough: Since the 1930s, the dusty pink dials have appeared rarely and in small numbers that responded in part to a fashionable penchant among South American patrons. An elusive acquisition—at one point, Patek Philippe made it only for favored clients—the salmon watch now returns in fresh designs from the venerable maker, as well as powerhouse creators like Vacheron Constantin and Czapek. A signal, perhaps, to live fully in the pink. ILLUSTRATION BY JULIA LUDLAM; INSPIRED BY JARDIN C7-21 TILE, MOSAICHSE.COM.…