VILLA VERSACE

Just got the Sotheby's catalog for the 2009 auction of Gianni Versace's Lake Como residence, Villa Fontanelle.  As you can see, I managed to resist the urge to scan the entire catalog.

Dirty clothes never stayed on the floor for more than a few seconds and beautiful gowns kept arriving, I had this fantasy that I was in an Antonioni film. I felt like a spoilt princess.  The Versaces really know how to live.
                                                                                Madonna, UK Vogue, October 1997.

An opulent version of Camelot?

Scans from Paintings, Furniture and Works of Art From the Collection of Gianni Versace, Villa Fontanelle, Lake Como, London 18 March 2009.

LIVING LARGE

Over the top, in your face. Say what you will, but old-school Gianni Versace was killer.

Here: three vintage Versace ads peeled from the pages of House & Garden, two videos featuring chain-clad gangs of amazonian supermodels (Naomi, Kate, Christy, Linda, Helena...) marching to Metallica and the 4 Non Blondes in '94, one of Gianni's residences, and a partridge in a pear tree... (No, but it's sort of like Christmas, isn't it?)

The image of the interior is Gianni Versace's Miami residence.  Evidently, it was a vast departure from his apartment in Milan, the Rizolli palazzo, designed by one of my nearest and dearest anti-decorators— Renzo Mongiardino.  I haven't seen this residence, but I'm dying to! Anyone know where I can find it?

Above, scan from September 1992 House&Garden

Above, scan from September 1991 House&Garden

Above, scan from April 1992 House&Garden

Above, Gianni Versace's Miami residence, scan from Vogue Living: Houses Gardens People.

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

I have a running joke with my mom that some of the chairs we've created over the years have (very much inadvertently, if you can believe it) taken on the personas of major fashion designers and artists.   Put them in a room together, and you have one heck of an A-list party...of chairs.

We even refer to them by their given names: "Have you seen Karl (Lagerfeld)?" "Last I saw him, he was in the closet with Betsey (Johnson)." Or, earlier: "You can sit on Jackson (Pollock). Gianni (Versace)'s seat is too pristine." Peculiar set up, to say the least.

So who's coming to dinner, you ask?

Karl Lagerfeld, clad in painted canvas upholstery:

Coco Chanel, sporting velvet tufting and a clean black ruffle:

Gianni and Donatella Versace, never without their Greek keys and ornamentation:

Betsey Johnson,  looking leggy in a sassy pink silk and leopard print:

John Galliano,  swashbuckling in studs, decked in pillaged gold and silk jewels:

And Jackson Pollock, looking electric and dripping liquid sunshine:

All chairs, pillows, and upholstery, photography and styling by (IN)DECOROUS TASTE.