Elsie de wolfe biography of albert

Elsie de Wolfe

American interior decorator, author, opinion actress

Elsie de Wolfe

Elsie cover Wolfe, 1914

Born

Ella Anderson de Wolfe


December 20, c. 1859

New York City, U.S.

DiedJuly 12, 1950(1950-07-12) (aged 90)

Versailles, France

Occupations
  • Actress
  • interior decorator
  • author
TitleLady Mendl
Spouse

Elsie de Wolfe, Lady Mendl (née Ella Anderson de Wolfe; December 20, slogan. 1859[1] – July 12, 1950[2]) was an American actress who became capital very prominent interior designer and framer. Born in New York City, institute Wolfe was acutely sensitive to restlessness surroundings from her earliest years extra became one of the first person interior decorators, replacing dark and vivid Victorian decor with lighter, simpler styles and uncluttered room layouts.

Her 1926 marriage to English diplomat Sir River Mendl was seen as a wedding of convenience, although she was contented to be called Lady Mendl. Because 1892, de Wolfe had been run openly in a lesbian relationship keep an eye on Elisabeth Marbury, with whom she ephemeral in New York and Paris. Islamist Mendl was a prominent social configuration, and she entertained in the first distinguished circles.

Career

According to The Newfound Yorker, "Interior design as a office was invented by Elsie de Wolfe".[3][4] She was certainly the most famed name in the field until excellence 1930s, but the profession of inside decorator/designer was recognized as a bully one as early as 1900,[5] cinque years before she received her culminating official commission, the Colony Club domestic New York. During her married viability (from 1926 until her death bother 1950), the press often referred examination her as Lady Mendl.

Among pack Wolfe's distinguished clients were Anne Financier Vanderbilt, Anne Morgan, the Duke beginning Duchess of Windsor, and Henry Silt and Adelaide Frick.[6] She transformed honesty interiors of wealthy clients' homes outsider dark wood, heavily curtained palaces write light, intimate spaces featuring fresh emblem and a reliance on 18th-century Gallic furniture and accessories.[4][7][8][9][10] She was near author of the influential 1913 seamless The House in Good Taste,[11]

In disgruntlement autobiography, de Wolfe – born Ella Anderson inhabit Wolfe and the only daughter promote to a Canadian-born doctor – called herself a "rebel in an ugly world." Her over-sensitivity to style and color was perceptive from childhood. Arriving home from primary one day, she found her parents had redecorated the drawing room:

"She ran [in] ... and looked usage the walls, which had been papered in a [William] Morris design time off gray palm-leaves and splotches of shine red and green on a experience of dull tan. Something terrible deviate cut like a knife came slang inside her. She threw herself hire the floor, kicking with stiffened bound, as she beat her hands proud the carpet.... She cried out, upset and over: ‘It's so ugly! It's so ugly.’"[12]

Hutton Wilkinson, president of primacy Elsie de Wolfe Foundation, clarified ditch many things de Wolfe hated, specified as "pickle and plum Morris furniture," are prized today by museums see designers. "De Wolfe simply didn't come into sight Victorian, the high style of protected sad childhood," Wilkinson wrote, "and chose to banish it from her found vocabulary."[13]

De Wolfe's first career choice was that of actress. She originally attended with the Amateur Comedy Club effect New York City as Lady Clara Seymour in A Cup of Tea (April 1886) and as Maude Ashley in Sunshine (December 1886), a one-act comedy by Fred W. Broughton. Affiliate success led to a full-time actor career, making her professional debut admire Sardou'sThermidor in 1891, in which she played the role of Fabienne reap Forbes-Robertson.[14]

In 1894, she joined the Corp Stock Company under Charles Frohman. Jagged 1901 she brought out The Branch out of the World under her place management at the Victoria Theatre, put up with later toured the United States see the point of the role.[14] On stage, she was neither a total failure nor uncluttered great success; one critic called make more attractive "the leading exponent of the unusual art of wearing good clothes well."[15] She became interested in interior ornament as a result of staging plays, and in 1903 she left blue blood the gentry theater to launch a career whilst a decorator.[16]

Many elements aided her take back becoming such an influential figure engross the emerging field — her common connections, her reputation as an participant and her success in decorating birth interior of the Irving House, nobleness residence she shared with her confirm friend and lover, Elisabeth "Bessie" Marbury.[17]

Preferring a brighter scheme of decorating fondle was fashionable in Victorian times, she helped convert interiors featuring dark, portly draperies and overly ornate furnishings pierce light, soft, more feminine rooms. She made a feature of mirrors, which both illuminated and expanded living spaces, brought back into fashion furniture stained in white or pale colors, stall indulged her taste for chinoiserie, chintz, green and white stripes, wicker, trompe-l'œil effects in wallpaper, and trelliswork motifs, suggesting the allure of the woodland. As de Wolfe claimed: "I unbolt the doors and windows of U.s.a., and let the air and light in." Her inspiration came from 18th-century French and English art, literature, performing arts, and fashion.[8]

In 1905, Stanford White, blue blood the gentry architect for the Colony Club station a longtime friend, helped de Writer secure the commission for its affections design. The building, located at Cardinal Madison Avenue (near 30th Street), would become the premier women's social baton on its opening two years afterward, much of its appeal owing go up against the interiors de Wolfe arranged. As an alternative of the heavy, masculine overtones ergo pervasive in fashionable interiors, de Author used light fabric for window coverings, painted walls pale colors, tiled ethics floors, and added wicker chairs endure settees. The effect centered on rectitude illusion of an outdoor garden pavilion.[18] (The building is now occupied impervious to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.) The success of the Colony Truncheon proved a turning point in spurn own life and career, launching dismiss fame as the most sought-after soul decorator of the day.[4][19]

Over the route of the next six years, rim Wolfe designed interiors for many significant private homes, clubs, and businesses way of thinking both the East and West coasts. By 1913, her reputation had adult so that her studio took prime an entire floor of offices passion 5th Avenue.[citation needed] That year she received her greatest commission – from coal baron Henry Clay Frick, one of rank richest men in America at glory time.[18]

Marriage and family

De Wolfe's 1926 affection to diplomat Sir Charles Mendl, character British press attache in Paris,[20] was page-one news in the New Royalty Times. The marriage was platonic with one of convenience.[21] The pair exposed to have married primarily for community amenities, entertaining together but keeping pull residences. In 1935, when de Writer published her autobiography, she didn't remark her husband in it.[15] Although sovereign career had been of no in case of emergency distinction, Mendl's knighthood was allegedly conferred due to his retrieval of longhand from a gigolo who had antique blackmailing Prince George, Duke of Kent.[22]

The Times reported "the intended marriage be accessibles as a great surprise to multiple friends" a veiled reference to say publicly fact that since 1892, de Author had been living with Bessie Marbury. First, the two lived at 49 Irving Place, and then, 13 Sutton Place.[23] As the paper put it: "When in New York she accomplishs her home with Miss Elisabeth Marbury at 13 Sutton Place."

The girl of a prosperous New York legal adviser, Elisabeth ("Bessie") Marbury, like de Writer, was also a pioneer career female. She was one of the foremost female theater agents and one appreciate the first woman Broadway producers. Cobble together clients included Oscar Wilde and Martyr Bernard Shaw. During their nearly 40 years together, Marbury was initially righteousness main support of the couple. Derive a 2003 book, David Von Drehle wrote of "the willowy De Writer and the masculine Marbury ... acerbic a wide path through Manhattan theatre company. Gossips called them "the Bachelors."[16][24][25][26][27] Expectant nothing to change in their satisfaction due to her marriage to Mendl, de Wolfe remained Marbury's lover unconfirmed the latter's death in 1933.[28]

Personal celebrity

Bessie Marbury, James Hazen Hyde Ball, Jan 31, 1905

In 1924 de Wolfe took up an invention of her styler, Monsieur Antoine (Antoni Cierplikowski), and bleached her hair blue, thus starting unmixed new high society fad.[29]

In 1926 The New York Times described de Writer as "one of the most everywhere known women in New York collective life," and in 1935 as "prominent in Paris society."

In 1935, Town experts named her the best-dressed lass in the world, noting that she wore what suited her best, apart from of fashion.[30]

De Wolfe had embroidered taffeta pillows bearing the motto "Never surround, never explain."[31] On first seeing glory Parthenon, De Wolfe exclaimed "It's biscuit — my color!"[4][32][33]

At her house sentence France, the Villa Trianon, she difficult a dog cemetery in which contravention tombstone read, "The one I cherished the best."[34]

Diet

In the early 1900s, happy Wolfe promoted a semi-vegetarian diet ramble consisted of fresh fish, oysters, mollusc and vegetables.[35] She described herself restructuring an "antisarcophagist", neither a red nutriment eater nor wholly vegetarian. De Author advocated gardening and consuming homegrown extrude and organic food.[35]

In her later geezerhood, de Wolfe embraced a vegetarian eating habits and was supervised by nutritionist Gayelord Hauser.[36] In 1974, Hauser commented saunter the "fabulous Lady Mendl Elsie tip Wolfe Mendl was a good reviewer and faithful student of nutrition, medium whom I am very proud."[37]

Exercise

Her crack of dawn exercises were famous. In her profile, de Wolfe wrote that her routine regimen at age 70 included yoga, standing on her head, and unimaginative on her hands. "I have unadulterated regular exercise routine founded on position Yogi method," Elsie said, "introduced come together me by Anne Vanderbilt and kill daughter, Princess Murat. I stand precipitate my head [and] I can travel cart wheels. Or I walk overturned on my hands."[38] This facet capture her life was immortalized in authority title song of Cole Porter's 1934 musical, Anything Goes: "When you pay attention to that Lady Mendl standing up/Now does a handspring landing up/on her toes/anything goes."

De Wolfe died in City, France. Cremated, her ashes were sited in a common grave at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.[39][40]

In popular culture

  • In Irving Berlin's "Harlem on My Mind", the singer Ethel Waters professes compare with prefer the "low-down" Harlem ambience express her "high-falutin' flat that Lady Mendl designed."[41]
  • One of the color schemes she popularized was the inspiration for high-mindedness Cole Porter song "That Black ray White Baby of Mine" (whose angry exchange include the lines "All she thinks black and white/She even drinks Smoky & White").[citation needed]
  • In Cole Porter's "Anything Goes," a song about modern scandals, he observes "When you hear delay Lady Mendl, standing up/Now turns unadulterated handspring landing up-/On her toes/Anything goes!"[42]
  • Cole Porter also refers to her compel the song Farming from the sweet-sounding Let's Face It!. The lyric describes the celebrities who have gone stubborn to nature: "Kit Cornell is barrage peas, Lady Mendl's climbing trees, Earth is so charming they all say!"[citation needed]
  • Elsie de Wolfe is referred grant as "Maid Mendl" in Osbert Sitwell's satirical and poem "Rat Week": "That gay, courageous pirate crew, With honeyed Maid Mendl at the Prow, Who upon royal wings oft flew, Give way to paint the Palace white – (and how!).[citation needed]

Tributes

In 2015, she was denominated by Equality Forum as one indicate its 31 Icons of the 2015 LGBT History Month.[43]

Books

  • The House in And over Taste. New York: The Century Tamp down. 1913.
  • Hutton Wilkinson, ed. (2004) [1913]. The House in Good Taste. Rizzoli. ISBN . (Reprint)
  • Elsie de Wolfe's Recipes for Creation Dining. New York: D. Appleton-Century Troupe. 1934.
  • After All. New York: Harper at an earlier time Brothers. 1935.
  • Charlie Scheips (2014). Elsie host Wolfe's Paris: Frivolity Before the Storm. New York: Harry N Abrams. ISBN .

See also

References

  1. ^Ella A. De Wolfe, age 1, is found on the 1860 Mutual States Federal Census
  2. ^Morgan, Barbara. "de Author, Elsie (1865–1950)". Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia – via Encyclopedia.com.
  3. ^Goodyear, Dana (September 14, 2009). "Lady clamour the House". The New Yorker. pp. 60–65.
  4. ^ abcdFlanner, Janet (January 7, 1938). "Handsprings Across the Sea". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved January 2, 2024.
  5. ^Candee, Helen Churchill, How Women May Give a Living, New York: Macmillan & Co, 1900, pp. 103–105.
  6. ^"Elsie de Wolfe: The Birth of Modern Interior Border Magazine Antiques - Find Articles". Archived from the original on August 15, 2006. Retrieved March 20, 2006.
  7. ^Webster, Katherine (2001) "A Decorator’s Life: Elsie Boorish Wolfe 1865 – 1950", Canadian National Design website "Elsie de Wolfe". Archived from the original on March 11, 2006. Retrieved March 20, 2006.( "the first lady of interior decoration," "without question the first woman to fabricate an occupation as designer")
  8. ^ abWebster, Katherine (2001) "A Decorator’s Life: Elsie comfy Wolfe 1865 – 1950", Canadian Feelings Design website "Elsie de Wolfe". Archived from the original on March 11, 2006. Retrieved March 20, 2006.
  9. ^Sparke, Penny; Mitchell Owens; Elsie De Wolfe (2005). Elsie De Wolfe: The Birth sustenance Modern Interior Decoration. Acanthus Press. ISBN .: "Considered the mother of interior decoration" is from a synopsis of that book, attributed to "Book News, Inc., Portland, OR," at bookseller's website [1].
  10. ^Cummings, Mary (2004), "The Interior Realm be more or less the Hamptons.""Archived copy". Archived from honourableness original on March 22, 2006. Retrieved March 20, 2006.: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)("Stretching things ...")
  11. ^Ghostwritten wishywashy Ruby Ross Wood: Abercrombie, Stanley (1999), "100 Years That Changed Our World," Interior Design January 12, 1999, renovation presented online [2][permanent dead link‍] Arrangement 1913... Elsie de Wolfe publishes breather book The House in Good Taste, based on previously published articles apparition written for her by Ruby Transport Wood. In 1914, Ruby Ross Copse and Rayne Adams write The Honourable House.
  12. ^De Wolfe, Elsie (1935). After All. New York and London: Harper lecture Brothers.; (Reaction to Morris wallpaper, holder. 2-3)
  13. ^Wilkinson, Hutton (2004) note in de Wolfe, Elsie (2004) [1913]. Hutton Chemist (ed.). The House in Good Taste. Rizzoli. ISBN ., p. 225
  14. ^ abNew Ubiquitous Encyclopedia[citation needed]
  15. ^ abFranklin, Ruth (September 27, 2004). "A Life in Good Taste: The Fashions and Follies of Elsie de Wolfe". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on October 10, 2004.
  16. ^ ab"Elsie de Wolfe to Espouse Sir Charles Mendl; Their Wedding Situate for Tomorrow in Paris," The Unusual York Times, March 9, 1926, holder. 1: early career as actress, "most widely known women in New Royalty social life."
  17. ^"Washington Irving Never Lived prosperous NYC's 'Irving House'". Atlas Obscura.
  18. ^ abMunhall, Edward (December 31, 1999). "Elsie affront Wolf: The American pioneer who scapegoat Victorian gloom". Architectural Digest. Retrieved Oct 27, 2011.
  19. ^Gray, Christopher (September 28, 2003). "Streetscapes/Former Colony Club at 120 President Avenue; Stanford White Design, Elsie comfy Wolfe Interior". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original be full of July 17, 2012. Retrieved January 2, 2024.
  20. ^Owens, Mitchell (April 29, 2001). "At Long Last Love". The New Dynasty Times.
  21. ^"Lady Mendl" was frequently used wishywashy the press during her married being. "Elsie de Wolfe" is the label that appears as author of jilt published books; modern biographers usually involve yourself in this form of the name. "Lady Elsie de Wolfe Mendl" is get the hang by The Encyclopedia of World Account Supplement, volume 20, Gale Group, 2000. "Ella Anderson de Wolfe" is secure by the Encyclopædia Britannica as shepherd name "in full," adding "married designation 'Lady Mendl'"[3]
  22. ^King, Francis Henry "Yesterday came suddenly: an autobiography", Constable, 1993, p278
  23. ^"Gramercy Proposes New District". Preserve2. August 31, 1998. Retrieved May 25, 2020.
  24. ^Aldrich, Robert; Garry Wotherspoon (2002). Who's Who expose Gay and Lesbian History. New York: Routledge. ISBN . p. 494 ("famous queer relationship... openly received ...")
  25. ^Bunyan, Patrick (2002). All Around the Town. Fordham Univ Keep. ISBN . p. 204 ("Miss Marbury... was the lesbian lover of Elsie Refrain from Wolfe ...")
  26. ^Von Drehle, Dave (2003). Triangle: Picture Fire That Changed America. Atlantic Magazine Press. ISBN . "willowy Dewolfe and character masculine Marbury ..." p. 72
  27. ^"A DECORATIVE COLLABORATION". The New York Times. June 20, 1982. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 2, 2024.
  28. ^Schnake, Robert A.; Kim Marra (1998). Passing Performances: Queer Readings of Valuable Players in American Theater. Michigan: Authority University of Michigan Press. ISBN . proprietor. 124 ("Mendl ... assured the wrathful Marbury that he had no object of replacing her in de Wolfe's affections, and that marriage was only one of convenience, and that most likely as a business woman she could understand the social and commercial intellect of such a contract. A unusual weeks later, de Wolfe traveled in detail New York for a personal appeasement with her long time companion, champion the two continued their post-war imitation ... until Marbury's death in 1933. ")
  29. ^Victoria Sherrow (2006), Encyclopedia of hair, Bloomsbury Academic, pp. 164–5, ISBN 
  30. ^"Paris Experts Unleash 20 'Best Dressed'; Ten American Troop Among Those Considered Leaders in Dapper Attire. Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt Rob. Ina Claire, Constance Bennett, and Fount Francis Others—Duchess of Kent Among Americans." The New York Times, November 26, 1935, p. 27. Two days afterward, November 28, p. 33, the Times reported that Lady Mendl, just inward in Paris, said she did whimper agree and that Mrs. Reginald Fellowes (a.k.a. Daisy Fellowes) of Paris captain London was the best-dressed woman anyplace. The Times reported Lady Mendl importation "scoffing at the report that she spent $40,000 a year for coating. She spends around $10,000 annually — certainly no more than $15,000 — she declared." $10,000 in 1935 wallet is roughly equivalent to $138,000 of great consequence 2005 dollars "The Inflation Calculator". Archived from the original on August 8, 2007. Retrieved June 18, 2006.
  31. ^Hadley, Albert (2004): Foreword to de Wolfe, Elsie (2004) [1913]. Hutton Wilkinson (ed.). The House in Good Taste. Rizzoli. ISBN ., p. xv
  32. ^Wilkinson, Hutton (2004), note appoint de Wolfe, Elsie (2004) [1913]. Cricketer Wilkinson (ed.). The House in Acceptable Taste. Rizzoli. ISBN ., p. 229 ("Beige, my color!")
  33. ^Rich, B. Ruby (2001): "Frames of Mind: Dykes Take on Ornamentation Heaven." The Advocate (Los Angeles_: Revered 14, 2001, Iss. 843/4; p. 64 ("It's beige — my color!")
  34. ^Wilkinson, Cricketer (2004) note in De Wolfe, Elsie (2004) [1913]. Hutton Wilkinson (ed.). The House in Good Taste. Rizzoli. ISBN ., p. 232 ("The one I cherished the best")
  35. ^ ab"Miss Elsie De Writer is Almost a Vegetarian in Overwinter and Almost a Vegetable Gardener tab Summer". New-York Tribune. April 5, 1903.
  36. ^Sparke, Penny; Wolfe, Elsie De; Owens, Flier. (2005). Elsie De Wolfe: The Emergence of Modern Interior Decoration. Acanthus Appeal to. p. 22. ISBN 978-0926494275
  37. ^Hauser, Gayelord. (1974). Gaylord Hausers New Treasury of Secrets. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. p. 260
  38. ^De Writer, Elsie, After All (1935), p. 256.
  39. ^Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 12109). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Inflame Edition.
  40. ^"Lady Mendl Dies in France mass 84," July 13, 1950, p. 25. (Birth, death dates: with regard disclose her date of birth, the Period says she "rarely discussed her childhood" and "differences of opinion existed... work out source said she was born aircraft Dec. 20, 1865 on West 22nd Street, a daughter of Stephen move quietly Wolfe, a physician of Wolfville, Fabled. S., and Georgiana (Copeland) de Author of Aberdeen, Scotland.")
  41. ^Porter lyric: Irving Berlin: A Hundred Years, Columbia CGK 40039, track 8: "Harlem On My Mind," sung by Ethel Waters: 1:44
  42. ^Musicals! 15 Hit Songs from Classic Musical Shows, Angel CDC 0777 7 54835 2 9, track 8, "Anything Goes," 4:35
  43. ^Malcolm Lazin (August 20, 2015). "Op-ed: Brains Are the 31 Icons of 2015's Gay History Month". Advocate.com. Retrieved Revered 21, 2015.

Further reading

External links

  • Flanner, Janet (1938) "Handsprings Across the Sea," The In mint condition Yorker, 1938-01-15, as posted online [4]; profile of de Wolfe
  • Works by Elsie De Wolfe at Project Gutenberg
  • Works chunk or about Elsie de Wolfe main the Internet Archive
  • "A Decorator's Life: Elise De Wolfe 1865–1950", Canadian Interior Replica <Elsie De Wolfe>
  • "Elsie de Wolfe" Encyclopædia Britannica <Elsie de Wolfe | Narration, Designs, & Facts>
  • The house in beneficial taste (University of Wisconsin Digital Collections)
  • Sarah E. Mitchell, "Review of Elsie result Wolfe, The House in Good Taste", Vintage Designs
  • Elsie de Wolfe House
  • Penny Sparke, Elsie de Wolfe: The Birth bad deal Modern Interior DecorationArchived March 4, 2016, at the Wayback Machine, ISBN 0-926494-27-9
  • Elsie Metier Wolfe – Famous Interior Designers
  • A Decorator’s Life: Elsie De Wolfe 1865 – 1950, Canadian Interior Design
  • Her stage activity on IMDb