Easter 1960: When Grownups Dressed Like Adults

In anticipation of Easter, I am posting a photograph of the Darling family going to Easter Sunday service back when we still lived in Grosse Pointe.  I think it was taken in 1960.  It was probably snapped by Granny Darling, my father's mother, who was likely standing at the entry of the church where my Grandfather Darling was the Rector.  Yes, one of Reggie's grandfathers was a man of the cloth.

Mummy Darling in navy, Camilla (Sister) in white, Father Darling bringing up the rear

Hermione in white dress with blue sash, Frecky in short suit with glasses, Reggie in shorts

My parents were in their late thirties when this photo was taken.  My sister Camilla is the eldest of their offspring, and is seen here at 15 years old, at the brink of womanhood, and home from boarding school on spring break.  Frecky is the next eldest, followed by Hermione, and then me.

This is one of my favorite Darling family photographs. Mostly because I love what we are all wearing.  We are what I consider to be appropriately dressed for attending church on Easter Sunday, at least for the time.  When this picture was taken young women of the American upper-middle classes still wished to dress in styles their mother's approved of, and their mothers still aspired to dress like ladies.  Boys looked forward to turning in their shorts for long pants, and a jacket and tie was considered daily wear for men.  In other words, this photograph was taken before all Hell broke loose in this country and the vast majority of Americans decided to throw off acting or dressing like adults when they grew up.  Nowadays it seems to me that most people I see out in public aspire to dressing like overgrown toddlers, or tramps, or worse.

In this photograph my mother is wearing a navy linen dress with a white collar and oversized, decorative white buttons, and she is sporting a straw hat decorated with a navy ribbon embroidered with what I recall were little white flowers (she had that hat for many years).  Camilla is wearing an attractive, waisted white dress that demurely shows off her lovely figure, and she appears to be wearing a hat made of white flowers and netting.  Camilla is artistic and clever with her hands, and probably made her pretty chapeau.  My only surprise is that neither of them is wearing white cotton gloves.  I came across a box of half a dozen pairs of such gloves wrapped in tissue paper that my mother had saved for forty years when we emptied out her apartment after she died.  [Editor's note: according to Sister, who graciously supplied me with this image, she was carrying her white cotton gloves that day and suspects that Mummy Darling's gloves were hidden in the jumble of the coats she was carrying--see her comment as Anon 1:18 p.m.]

My father is shown taking up the rear wearing a poplin sack suit, most likely bought at Brooks Brothers, and brown oxfords.  To this day one of the sense memories from my childhood is the smell of the wax he used when polishing his shoes, which he took great care with.  Frecky and I are wearing little boy shorts outfits likely assembled from a combination of Best & Co. and the Junior League "Nearly New Shoppe" where my mother volunteered once a week.  Hermione is the little girl in the front wearing a white dress with a blue sash.

Do you ever find yourself wishing that people still dressed as well as we did in those days?  I do.  I understand that styles and tastes change and always will, but I still find it a bit "off" when I (infrequently) attend the Episcopal church near Darlington that I (sometimes) go to and see grown parishioners arrive for the services wearing tee shirts and jeans, even on High Holy Days.  At least they're attending church, I suppose.

I believe that grownups should dress like adults when visiting places that merit the respect of appropriate attire, and that too few in America do so today.  Did you notice that I used the word "respect" here?  Because that is what I believe appropriate attire conveys--respect for one's surroundings, respect for one's hosts, and respect for one's peers.  I am not so assinine as to think that today men should only wear suits and ties and women should wear white gloves and hats every time they walk out their front door.  But I do believe that the casualness of the clothing I see many people wearing today in better restaurants, the theater, concert halls, houses of worship, and private parties is disrespectful, and that people should dress up more when they go to such places and events.  Since when did the supposed comfort of the wearer trump all other considerations when determining what constitutes appropriate attire?

Believe me, I don't want to turn the sartorial clock back to 1960, I just would like people to make more of an effort to dress more thoughtfully and respectfully of the places they visit and the sensibilities of the other people they find there.  I recognize that there are times that it is appropriate for grownups to wear the tee shirts, cargo shorts, jeans, flip flops, sneakers, and baseball caps seen everywhere today, such as a quick trip to the corner store to pick up a quart of milk or when knocking about on a Saturday afternoon.  But in my view the preponderance of the grown Americans that I see out in public dressed so casually would be better served if they left such clothing to the sandbox set it was originally intended for, and made more of an effort to dress in an approximation of what used to be called an adult.  It would certainly be easier on the eyes of those of us who have to look at such people.

Tell me, am I preaching to the choir here?

Dinner at '21'

For a fortunate few of us over the age of forty, the three words “Dinner at ‘21’” produce a frisson of anticipation and excitement like no other.

The entrance to the '21' Club

Image courtesy of same

I first heard of the '21' Club, the fabled Manhattan restaurant, as a boy from my parents, who went there for the first time shortly after they were married.  My mother referred to '21' as being a Mount Olympus of glamorous and expensive dining, and she and my father returned there from time to time when they visited New York over the ensuing decades.  She said that she would never forget the first time she crossed its threshold in the 1940s as a newlywed.  She felt a bit out of her element that night, wearing a Peck & Peck cocktail suit and a demure pearl necklace while the other women dining there were wearing what appeared to her to be the “latest French fashions” and “real jewels.”  But that added to the magic of the place, she thought.

Grace Kelly serving Jimmy Stewart dinner from '21' in Rear Window

I also remember being wildly impressed as a boy one afternoon watching Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window on the black-and-white television in my parent’s study when Grace Kelly, in a cloud of couture chiffon, arrived at Jimmy Stewart’s Greenwich Village apartment with a waiter from '21' in tow, wheeling a cart containing dinner for the two of them from the restaurant.  Talk about glamorous!

'21' Club facade

Image courtesy of same

The first time I went to '21' was as an undergraduate.  I spent a weekend visiting a classmate in New York, and his parents took us there for dinner.  I was beside myself with excitement when I found out where we were going (and that they were paying for it), and I felt incredibly grown up and swell dining in its swank rooms.  We ate in the Bar Room, an inspired fantasy of dark paneling, low light, and red-and-white checked table cloths, and noteworthy for the huge collection--hanging from the ceiling--of toy trucks, ships, and airplanes emblazoned with the names of major corporations, along with sports memorabilia and other mementos.  All of these had been given to the restaurant by its regulars culled from the top ranks of industry, entertainment, and sports. That evening Arlene Dahl (or was it Audrey Meadows?) was settled into one of the banquettes holding court with four men, and the room was packed with what appeared to this young man as an impossibly grown-up and sophisticated crowd.

The Bar Room at '21'

Image courtesy of same

After college I would occasionally meet friends for cocktails at '21', but would never have dinner there because I couldn’t afford it on my junior banker’s salary.  At that time '21' attracted a big after-work crowd of suit-wearing men who packed the bar, drinking martinis, Manhattans, and the like.  It was a manly-man kind of place, the air full of cigarette smoke and testosterone.  My friends and I would get thoroughly soused while eating as much of the bar’s free peanuts and crackers as possible, and then repair to a nearby Irish bar to drunkenly wolf down a dinner from its far-more economically priced steam-table offerings.

A view of the banquettes in the Bar Room at '21'

Image courtesy of same

Over the intervening years I was only a sometime visitor to '21', mostly for work-related dinners with clients, bond roadshows, or big closing dinners for deals I had worked on.  One time I met the mother of a young man I was seeing there for a drink, when she was in town to attend an auction where one of her father’s paintings, a minor Van Gogh, was being sold.  But mostly I didn’t go to '21' that much, since I preferred to spend my evenings with friends my age in younger and racier watering holes.

Yet another view of the bar at '21'

Image courtesy of same

A number of years ago Boy and I decided to take his best friend from college and his (then) wife out to dinner to celebrate his friend’s fortieth birthday.  We decided that '21' would be a suitably grown-up place to honor such a milestone, and so I booked a table for the four of us in the Bar Room, which to me epitomizes the restaurant unlike any of the other rooms available there.  I arrived at the restaurant early, ahead of my dinner companions, and decided to wait for them at the bar.  Given my memories of what the bar at '21' had been like after working hours when I was younger, I was surprised to see that there was almost no one there that evening, with the Bar Room virtually empty of patrons.  According to the barman I spoke with, the crowd of manly-men I remembered clogging the bar after work had mostly dispersed over the years, and was pretty much killed off altogether when the city instituted its no-smoking laws earlier that year.  Contributing to the sparse attendance that evening was the fact it was high summer, one of the slowest times of year for New York’s restaurants.

We had a very good, albeit expensive, dinner with our friends that night, and I was glad to see that the Bar Room’s tables filled up over the evening.  My fears that '21' was in its death-throes appeared to have been unfounded.

I had not returned to '21' since that dinner, more than five years ago, but did so for the first time several months back when I booked a table for a pre-theater dinner on the evening that Boy and I had such an unpleasant experience attending A Little Night Music, which I wrote about in an earlier posting.  I was curious to see what I would find.  In the meantime '21' had received a flurry of publicity when it became the last restaurant in Manhattan to relax its requirement that men must wear a jacket and tie for admittance.  Today it remains one of the few that still requires men to wear jackets, and “encourages” them to wear ties, at least for dinner.  In other words, it’s still a grown-up kind of place, holding on to customs that in other parts have gone the way of the dinosaur.  When I arrived, a handful of tables in the Bar Room were occupied with pre-theater diners, and there were perhaps half a dozen patrons standing at the bar, all middle-aged men . . . like me.

Individual cocktail mixing spoons from the bar at '21'

Given to me by Tara, the martini goddess

Since I was the first of my party to arrive, I sidled up to the bar and ordered a martini from the woman working behind it, expertly mixing cocktails.  I fell in to a conversation with her, and learned that her name was Tara and that she broke the sex barrier at the club when she became its first female bartender several years earlier, much to the initial consternation of the guys, all of whom have come around in the meantime.  If there is one restaurant in New York that I would expect to serve a perfect martini, it would be '21' (along with the Four Seasons, the other leading contender, in my view).  I am pleased to report that Tara gave me the most perfectly made martini that I can recall being the happy recipient of. Off to a good start!  While she went about her duties I listened in on several of the conversations that my fellow companions standing at the bar were having and heard more than one of them say “I remember the first time I came to ‘21’, it was when I was still in college . . .” and I realized yet again that Reggie’s life experience is but a mere repetition of the many, many thousands that have trod a similar path before him.

As my fellow blogger Lindaraxa wrote in her charming reminiscence of '21' http://lindaraxa.blogspot.com/2010/01/21-club-chicken-hash-with-gruyere.html, one doesn’t go to '21' for the food, really.  It’s more for the experience of the place.  While the food is perfectly good, and quite tasty, it is not particularly memorable. But then it needn’t be, in my view, because the pleasure I take in dining at '21' (and I have been there several more times since Boy and I ate there two months ago), is the sheer joy of being there, experiencing it, and seeing the place in action.

'21' is a very well-run establishment that caters to a well-heeled crowd of appreciative regulars.  There is a clear hierarchy among the staff, starting from the suit-wearing men and women who greet you as you enter the restaurant.  They are solicitous and formal, and address you by name.  They hand you off to a tuxedo-wearing waiter who shows you to your table and attends to your needs for the rest of the evening.  The waiters are, in turn, supported by an army of assistants wearing white jackets and black bowties.  When the restaurant is full, which it has been the times I’ve been there, and the staff is in full throttle, there is electricity in the air.  '21' is still a manly kind of place after all these years, catering to manly-men and the ladies who like ’em that way.

Adding to the pleasure of dining at '21' is the presence of the bold-face names you sometimes see there, such as a retired big-time ball player, or a tycoon, or . . . Henry Kissinger, who made a spectacular entrance to much hubbub the night Boy and I had dinner there earlier this week.

All in all, it’s a really good show.

'21' Club
21 West 52nd Street
New York, New York 10019
(212) 582-7200
http://www.21club.com/

Ballooning, Raking, and Pruning at Darlington

Early this Sunday, when I took Pompey out for his morning constitutional, I heard what sounded like gas jets turning on and off.  As many of my readers will agree, when one owns a house common sense indicates that such sounds merit investigation.  The noise was coming from the rear of our property, so that is where I went, and what did I find but a hot air balloon flying over our back yard!  I ran into the house to get my camera.  By the time I was able to snap a picture of it the balloon had traveled a distance, so the image I was able to capture is rather small.  Within a minute the balloon had vanished from my sight.  Although not clear from looking at the photograph, the balloon was made of alternating stripes of yellow and red cloth, and was very colorful.

High above Darlington

Later that morning, Rich and Junior arrived to finish repairing the winter damage to our gravel drives.  Although gravel drives are beautiful to look at and delightful to drive on (the crunch of a well-tended gravel drive under tires is a very satisfying sound indeed), they require a considerable amount of maintenance, at least here in the American northeast.  A yearly ritual once the snows have subsided is to return the gravel that has been deposited on the surrounding lawns during plowing back on to the drive and then rake out the surface to reestablish a pleasing uniformity of appearance.

Rich is returning the gravel to the drive while Junior redistributes it

(note tasteful snow markers in first photo)

Rich raking out the drive

A job well done. The same view, before and after

(again, note tasteful snow markers)

Another spring ritual at Darlington is pruning the Hydrangea paniculata 'Kyushu' of last season's canes.  We leave the growth in place for winter interest, but it is necessary to prune back quite hard before the shrubs begin to push out new buds.  When pruned, they look almost Japanese in their severity.  Boy is the master pruner at Darlington--I have been forbidden from engaging in any pruning due to my less than perfect attempts at it in the past.  Boy spent the better part of both Saturday and Sunday mornings pruning the shrubs.  I love the way they look shorn of their canes, ready for a new season of growth.

Boy beginning the pruning of our Hydrangea -- the "before" shot

Two down, and nine to go

A pile of canes from one of the shrubs

The fully pruned Hydrangea -- the "after" shot

Rest assured, these Hydrangea are hearty growers and will send out an abundance of growth.  By mid summer they will be enormous, luxuriant beauties, and covered with fragrant, frothy white flowers well into autumn.

All photos by Reggie Darling

Outside and Inside: Spring at Darlington

It was wildly and unseasonably warm today in the Hudson River Valley, in the mid-70's, well above the 50's that are typical this time of year.  The land is coming to life after a particularly brutish winter.  Insects are flying, and there are signs of bluebirds building nests in the houses we've put up for them along the split-rail fence.  Spring is springing at Darlington.

Galanthus nivalis (common snowdrop)

This morning I met with the foreman of our arborists, as we have quite a bit of pruning to do to address the winter damage to the trees on our property.  It's going to take their crew a full day to prune and cable the trees, and they'll need a bucket rig to get high up in them.  Darlington has been hit hard with storms over the last eighteen months. We've lost at least eight mature trees, leaving some gaping holes in the landscape.  One of the trees we lost, a magnificent century-and-a-half-old Quercus rubra (Red Oak), was ripped out of the ground by a tornado last summer and thrown on a neighbor's property.  I still feel sick when I think of it.

The buds on the Fagus sylvatica (European beech) are plumping up

But moving on to more pleasant thoughts . . . .  Rich and Junior have started the spring cleanup of the property, beginning with returning the gravel they plowed up onto our lawns to the drive where it belongs.  Boy has begun pruning the drift of eleven Hydrangea paniculata 'Kyushu' that we planted six years ago.  It is gorgeous when in bloom, and an amazing honey-bee magnet.

Does anyone know what these yellow flowers are?

These diminutive yellow flowering plants were given to us by my cousin Joanna McQuail Reed shortly after we bought Darlington, when she visited us one spring.  Joanna was a legendary gardener and former president of the Herb Society of America, among many other things, and she and her Longview Farm in Malvern, Pennsylvania, were featured in many books and articles.  She was profiled in Starr Ockenga's marvelous book Earth on Her Hands: The American Woman and Her Garden.  Boy and I enjoy these flowers as a reminder of Joanna, who died in 2002.  We don't know their name.  We remember that Joanna called them something like "winter aconite," but we've not been able to find such a plant in our garden reference books.  If anyone reading this knows what they are, please let me know!

A drift of Galanthus nivalis

When we bought Darlington, the property had a dozen or so flower beds planted in the 1930s and '40s by Mrs. Proctor, the former owner.  While the beds produced masses of pretty, old-fashioned flowers, they were beyond redemption and were also haphazardly placed around the grounds.  We've ripped them out.  The lone survivors of Mrs. Proctor's beds are these Galanthus nivalis, or common snowdrops.  They dot the grounds, and we've extended their presence on our property by dividing and transplanting them over the years.

It's not just outdoors that spring is springing at Darlington. It is happening indoors, too.

We were given this Clivia by Dennis Mareb, the owner of Windy Hill Farm in Great Barrington, Massachusetts.  Windy Hill is a top-drawer nursery specializing in unusual specimens, and is our primary source for the trees and shrubs we've planted at Darlington.  Dennis and his wife, Judy, arrived at a Christmas party years ago with this Clivia; it has bloomed every March since.

Rosmarinus officinalis in bloom

We have owned this Rosemary for almost a decade, and we learned how to successfully overwinter it indoors from my cousin Joanna.  The key is to leave it outdoors through one or two hard frosts so it goes dormant.  It blossomed last weekend when these little purple flowers appeared.

Moving back outdoors, here's one last shot of our spring landscape at Darlington.  Oh, and there's Pompey, too!

Pug, Buxus, G. nivalis, and the unidentified yellow flower

All photos by Boy Fenwick

Reggie's Rules For Social Reciprocity, Part II: Myth vs. Reality

Following on my recent discussion of the two rules that are the foundation of "Reggie's Rules of Social Reciprocity" in my post dated February 26th, I thought it would be helpful for me to explain exactly what I believe social reciprocity does and does not entail.  And I will seek to accomplish this by outlining, and then debunking, various myths that I have heard over the years from people mistaken in their understanding of what is, and what is not, required.

Myth 1:  Hosts should entertain solely out of the goodness and generosity of their hearts.  It is unreasonable, petty, and calculating of them to expect a return invitation of some kind.

Reality:  Not true.  As I have already explained in my previous post on this subject, while not the primary reason for entertaining, the prospect of return invitations by one’s guests is a pleasing benefit that a host should reasonably look forward to, assuming that host and guest both wish to maintain a social relationship going forward.

Myth 2:  I, as a guest, am under no obligation to reciprocate my hosts’ invitations, regardless of the number of times they entertain me.

Reality:  This is only true if you don’t care for the host, but then why accept subsequent invitations if you don’t?  If, on the other, hand you like the person(s) who hosted you and wish to maintain a social relationship with them going forward, including a return invitation at some point, then the answer is you MUST reciprocate in accordance with your means and circumstances.

Myth 3:  It doesn’t matter how long it takes me to reciprocate my host’s hospitality.

Reality:  While there is some leeway here, you really should strive to reciprocate hospitality within three months.  After that it starts getting stale.

Myth 4:  One can only reciprocate with an equivalent type of event, such as a cocktail party for a cocktail party, a dinner party for a dinner party, etc.

Reality:  Not true.  The form of the entertainment you provide is incidental and is dependent on your means and circumstances.  If we only reciprocated with like events that would mean we all threw the same party, which would get rather boring, wouldn’t it?

Myth 5:  I couldn’t possibly invite the So-and-Sos to my house because they are much richer/better cooks/throw more expensive parties/have nicer things/are better connected than I am/am/can/do/am.

Reality:  Absolutely and utterly wrong, and a frequent misconception.  The So-and-Sos, if they are civilized people, will be delighted to join you in whatever entertainment you are capable of providing.  Simply because they hosted you to a formal dinner doesn't mean they won't enjoy spending an evening with you at your house eating Chinese takeout and watching the Oscars (as my friend and fellow blogger Lindaraxa commented on my first post on this subject).  As one of my very grandest and most generous friends once said to me, “Reggie, my dear, I am thrilled to be invited into anyone’s home these days, it’s become so rare.  I could care less whether I’m invited to a white tie dinner dance in a palace or for crackers and cheese in a third-floor walkup.  Just to be invited somewhere by someone today is such a pleasure!”

Never be ashamed of how you live or what you haven’t got, and do not use it as an excuse to refrain from returning an invitation.  Most people are delighted to be invited anywhere, so long as they like the person who is inviting them.  Your friends already know your circumstances.  They will appreciate any effort you make on their behalf.

Myth 6:  I couldn’t possibly invite the Such-and-Suches to my house because they are much younger/older/poorer/less well-connected that I am and, besides, they don't further my social agenda.

Reality:  Utterly and infuriatingly wrong.  Don’t be a self-serving, social-climbing, insular snob.  Never refrain from inviting people to your party simply because they don’t have the same (or better) features as the face that stares back at you when you look in the mirror.  If you like them and believe they will be a net addition to your party, then for goodness' sake invite them.  Recognize, however, that they may not be able to entertain you in the same manner you entertain them.  But be prepared to have a delightful time when they ask you to join them one evening, either at their house or elsewhere.

Myth 7:  I can’t possibly entertain.  I only live in a small apartment, and I don’t have any nice dishes or anything much to entertain with.  Besides, I can’t cook!

Reality:  No one says you must only entertain in your home, and that you have to prepare a groaning board for your guests.  There are all sorts of ways that you can entertain someone or a couple who has extended you hospitality when you don’t have the ability (or inclination) to do so where you live.  Here are some suggestions:

• Take them out to a meal in a fun restaurant;
• Organize a picnic in a local park for a summer’s evening concert and arrive with prepared boxed meals;
• Treat them to admission and drinks one evening at a museum -- many cities have museums that are open one night during the week;
• Plan a weekend afternoon’s road-trip to a nearby town or destination, and create a fun and interesting itinerary;
• Ask them to join you for a cooking class one night offered by a local culinary school or chef;
• Sign up for a wine-tasting seminar;
• Buy tickets to a show or sporting event that you will both enjoy;
• Take them to an interesting lecture and treat them to a bite to eat afterwards;

The principle here is that it is critical to define “entertaining” as more than throwing a party in one’s home.  If that isn’t practical, then take the initiative and invite your guests to join you (at your expense) to do something fun, interesting, and enjoyable – however you may define it.  At the end of the day it almost doesn’t matter what you do at all.  It certainly doesn’t matter how much it costs, as there are many options available to you to entertain inexpensively.  Just do something!

Exceptions:

The concept of social reciprocity applies only to private entertaining.  It does not apply to public entertainments, corporate events, or anything work-related for that matter.  You are under no obligation to reciprocate invitations to the following:

• Fund-raising benefits that you are invited to by a friend where you are expected to buy a ticket and bear the cost of your attendance; your support of the event is sufficient.  However, it is in your right to expect that friends whose charitable causes you have supported by attending their favored benefits return the favor should you invite them to one that you support in the future;
• Anything work-related.  Entertainment provided by people that are senior than you are at the office or workplace does not entail a requirement to reciprocate, particularly when the cost of the entertainment is expensed to your firm.  This includes your boss taking you and your spouse out to dinner or entertaining you at his/her home.  It is a different matter, though, if a colleague at the same level as you invites you over for dinner, since that is where it has crossed over the line from work into the realm of social friendship.

The only other exception is when the recipient of the hospitality is in the midst of confronting a major, life-changing event that absorbs all of their faculties and attention.  That would include an illness, the dissolution of a marriage, a bereavement, or similar.

But that’s it.

Some of my readers may be surprised that there aren’t more exceptions on this list.  That is because I believe that the obligation to reciprocate hospitality is a broadly-applied one, covering virtually ALL private social situations, and crossing all social boundaries, economic strata, and generations.  The key take away remains: reciprocity is required when the guest has enjoyed the hosts’ hospitality and where the maintenance and strengthening of such relationship is agreed to by both parties.  As I have said before: the form of such entertainment or hospitality is incidental, the obligation of it is not.

And that's all I have to say on the matter.


Cartoon from Terribly Nice People by Wlliam Hamilton, G. B. Putnam's Sons, 1975

The String Dispensers of Darlington

Long before the advent of rubber bands, Scotch Tape (TM), or twist-ties, people secured packages, bags, and bundles with string and twine.  And just as there are numerous dispensers today for tape, previous generations had myriad dispensers for string and twine.  At Darlington House we have built a tidy collection of antique string and twine dispensers, which is the subject of today’s essay.

While we do not entirely ignore modern conveniences at Darlington, we do attempt to be selective in those we use, preferring instead to rely on time-tested and usually “greener” alternatives when reasonably possible.  We use as little plastic as we can on our property, preferring natural alternatives.  Once you set your mind to it, it is quite remarkable how easy it is to reduce one’s use of plastics and petroleum-based products, without going to lunatic extremes.

That extends to using string and twine made from natural fibers.  I prefer string rather than tape when wrapping packages, and I use twine to tie bundles of paper for recycling.  In the kitchen we use string to truss poultry for roasting and to re-seal food packages.  It’s more pleasant to open a parchment-wrapped sandwich tied with string than to open a resealable plastic bag containing said sandwich, despite the slight convenience of the latter.

We do, of course, keep a stock of plastic bags on hand, but we try not to use them when a greener alternative will do, time permitting.  Beyond the kitchen we use twine in our flower-arranging room to secure bunches of flowers, and we keep a stock of it in our garden house for many uses outdoors.

One of the pleasures of using string or twine is pulling it out of handy dispensers.  Technically, our string dispensers belong to Boy, as it is his collection, but I get to use them just the same.  Unlike today’s tape dispensers, where the unifying feature is utilitarian ugliness, the forms of antique string and twine dispensers are wonderfully, and in many cases whimsically, clever.

Most of ours are made of cast iron, but we have wood ones as well.  Many are shaped like beehives--the most common form--but we’ve found them in other shapes too, including one that is molded as a ball of string.

Aside from being attractive, string dispensers are ideal for keeping balls of string and twine in order, instead of jumbled and unwinding in a drawer.  Also, having string ready on the counter promotes its use.

We find string dispensers in group shops and at antiques shows, but, given how ubiquitous they once were, we are surprised how infrequently we come across them.  They also show up on eBay, but we refrain from buying there because reproductions are being made today; it’s best to buy them in person so you can examine them closely to be sure they are old.  Prices for cast-iron examples range from as little as fifty dollars (a genuine score) up to several hundred dollars.  Hand-carved wood ones are usually more expensive, since they weren’t mass-produced and are rarer survivors.

So if you haven’t got a string dispenser, I suggest you consider getting one.  But be forewarned: It’s hard to stop at only one . . .

All photos by Boy Fenwick

The Pompey Chronicles, Part III: For the Love of Pompey

The is the third and penultimate installment in my series of essays on Pompey, our most-beloved pug.

The Scamp was born on May 12, 1999, and we picked him up on a sunny Saturday afternoon eight weeks later at a dog show in Newburgh, New York, where his breeder was showing.  My life changed forever that day, because that is when I fell irretrievably and irrevocably in love with our delightful and most-beloved pug, Pompey.  For that is the name he came home with at the insistence of my mother, who came up with it.

Boy with Pompey at the Dog Show on

the day we picked him up from the breeder, July 1999

Boy and I had come to the dog show prepared with a collar for Pompey, but when we met the breeder and showed her the collar (a very smart one, I might add, that we had carefully selected at a carriage-trade shop in the City), she burst out laughing and said, "Well, he might grow into it someday!"  For, as we found, he was still quite tiny, just a wee, wobbly, bobbly pug puppy, still no larger than an average sized kitten.  We learned that his brothers had further eclipsed him in size and were expected to grow into full Alpha-male standard size (that is, if a pug could ever be considered an Alpha dog), but that our little Pompey was destined never to exceed the size of an adolescent.  In other words, we were the proud owners of the runt of the litter.

Pompey's first day at Darlington

And true to prediction, Pompey weighs only 14 pounds at full maturity, right at the absolute bottom of the breed standard of 14 to 18 pounds (for both dogs and bitches), and about the same as a medium sized male cat.  Most of the pugs I see on the street weigh rather a lot more than the breed standard (along with the rest of America), so relative to many of the pugs we come across when out for a walk, Pompey is quite small.  We have kept him in good shape and carefully regulate his food intake (I find it is easier to control his diet than mine), so he has a nice figure, retaining a good tuck.  To this day, as he approaches his eleventh birthday, we are often asked if he is a puppy.

Pompey visiting Sister Darling

Since bringing Pompey home with us we have learned the following about pugs:

• They have insatiable appetites and will eat anything and everything, and then they'll want to eat some more;
• They want to be with you at all times, and will follow you from room to room;
• They are impossibly cute;
• Their most favored place during the day is in your lap, whenever possible.  When they can't sit on your lap, they will often sit on your feet;
• They will sleep in your bed with you; there is no argument here;
• They are pathetic watchdogs, they're more likely to lick a stranger than bark at him;
• They are impossibly cute;
• Stairs can be an issue; they don't always have the confidence to navigate a full flight of stairs;
• They scream; either when they are supremely unhappy, such as when you briefly leave them behind in the car when you are out doing errands, or when they are prevented from greeting someone they are determined to see, such as the UPS man dropping off a package, or a neighbor stopping by, and they're trapped in another room or upstairs (see "stairs can be an issue", above).  Such screaming can be blood-curdling, and so unnerving to the unitiated listener that I've had to reassure strangers that it is a characteristic of the breed, and not--contrary to what it may sound--the deranged shrieking of an enraged duck I am holding captive for unfathomable reasons;
• They are impossibly cute;
• They are wonderful companions under most circumstances, but particularly when one is feeling blue or sick--they will stay in bed with you or at your side for the duration of when you are down for the count;
• They are extremely sociable, and love meeting new people;
• They don't like getting wet, they hate rain, they find snow perplexing, and they'd rather do anything than go for a swim;
• They are professional snugglers;
• They can't play ball--their snub-nosed mouths are too small to be able to pick up a ball, even a tennis ball; they much prefer soft, plushy toys that they can get a purchase on;
• They are impossibly cute;
• They love playing catch with squeaky plushy toys, but quickly lose interest;
• They are stubborn;
• They can't run around in fields when out for a country walk because their legs are too short;
• They can be highly amusing;
• They love to eat banana, cheese, strawberries, blueberries, clementine sections, most vegetable trimmings, and pretty much any other kind of treat, including an Altoid every now and then;
• They sometimes scoot around like a flying Mighty Mouse when they are really having fun; and
• They are impossibly cute.

"Here I come to save the day!"

Did I tell you that Pompey is actually a remarkably good-quality pug?  It's true, and through no fault of mine, even though I was the one who found him.  As I wrote in a previous installment of the "Pompey Chronicles," I began my search with the Pug Club of Greater New York, and fortunately I was directed to a breeder that I later learned was considered at the time to be one of the top breeders of pugs in America, with dozens and dozens of champions to their credit, including several best-of-breed winners at Westminster.  I had no idea; I just thought I was buying a pug puppy.

Pug on a rug

It started to dawn on me several months after we brought Pompey home that he was actually a very nice looking example of the breed's standard, despite his diminutive size.  At first I thought it was perhaps pride of owership (doesn't every parent consider their child to be "gifted" these days?), but Boy and I started to suspect that Pompey was really quite good, particularly for a "pet-quality" pug, and in fact better than almost every other pug we had come across when out and about.

Pug in a pot

This was confirmed shortly thereafter when we attended a party at the National Arts Club here in New York that was thrown to celebrate the publication of a book called Pugs in Public, by Kendall Farr, and where more than sixty pugs had been invited to attend the party, including our Pompey.  As we walked through the chaos of pugs and owners in the main room at the club a voice boomed out across the throng "Bring that pug to me right now!" clearly referring to our little Pompey.  The command came from an imperious-looking older woman who was seated in a chair, banging her cane on the floor, demanding our attention.  We did as we were told and walked over to her.  She picked up Pompey and examined him like a trainer looking over a horse for the first time.  After a bit she looked up at us and said, "This is the best pug here today, and the only one with true championship potential!  I'd recognize him anywhere, he's from Such-and-Such kennel, isn't he?"  We were astonished that she knew the breeder just by looking at Pompey, and asked her name.  I was even more surprised to learn that she was, in fact, the very secretary of the Pug Club of New York with whom I had spoken when I first initiated my search!

Pompey's first birthday

Sombreros and pinatas, anyone?

Once Pompey joined our household he quickly established himself as a member of our family, and in many ways he completed it (as pets often do for childless couples).  Boy owns his own business and most days takes Pompey with him to the office, where he has become the firm's mascot, something that would have been impossible at the Investment Bank where I work.  I usually get home after they do, and there is no greater pleasure for me than when I open the door to our city apartment after a long day and Pompey runs up to greet me, demanding to be picked up and kissed.  He and I both enjoy sitting together on the sofa, snuggled up while watching television or reading, and I'm sure that bedtime would be lonely indeed if it didn't include our little bundle of puginess to share it with.  I particularly enjoy hanging out with him during weekends at Darlington.  He is very affectionate and loving, remarkably even-tempered and good-natured, and an all-around wonderful companion.  I miss him when we go away on a trip and have to send him to a boarding kennel, and I look forward to reuniting with him when we return.  In short, I adore him.

Another pug party held at the National Arts Club

I have found that one of the pleasures of owning a dog is experiencing them at every stage of their lives, from puppyhood through adolescence, maturity, and then finally old age. We have enjoyed the first three stages of Pompey's life and we are now just beginning the fourth and final stage.  Pugs live on average twelve to seventeen years, so we can expect at least several more years of his company, and I hope many more.  But there is no denying that he is starting to slow down just a tiny bit.  Not much, really, but I can see signs developing.  There is a greater tendency to hesitate at a stair, a wish to go back inside sooner from a walk, and not quite as much bounce in his trot.  To the casual observer these signs would be imperceptible, but I can see them.  And it is with a certain poignancy that I do so, as they are a reminder that I have fewer days of his company to look forward to than I have to look back upon.  Knowing this is all the more reason for me to cherish him as I do.  I know that I will be bereft when I no longer have the joy of his company, my most-beloved Pompey.  I do so love him.

Pompey in my arms

But for now I look forward to years more of his company, and I plan on making the most of it, never taking it for granted.  To that end we've decided to bring Pompey with us to the beach house we've rented for two weeks this summer, because we can't bear to be parted from him for that long.  Besides, he's never been to the beach before, and we want to see what he makes of it.

Pompey in maturity, taken this morning

But we're not the only ones who find our little Pompey adorable, or photogenic.  Over the years he has appeared in quite a few magazines and books, mostly in stories shot at Darlington House.  I plan on featuring a number of those images in my next and final installment of this series.

Next week: Pompey, the Published Pug

All photos by Reggie Darling or Boy Fenwick, except Pompey visiting Sister Darling which was taken by Sister Darling

Reggie's Rooms II: The Saloon at Avenue House

I first came across images of Sir Albert Richardson's enchanting drawing room at Avenue House in Ampthill, Bedfordshire, in John Cornforth's absorbing book The Inspiration of the Past: Country House Taste in the Twentieth Century published in 1985 by Viking Penguin in association with Country Life magazine.  According to Mr. Cornforth's deliciously informative and lavishly illustrated book, Professor Richardson (as he was also known) was considered to be "one of the first admirers" in England in the early part of the twentieth century "...of the style of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, as well as one of the principal promoters of the continuity of the classical tradition."  This view is amply borne out by the beauty of his decoration of the Saloon (as it was called) at Avenue House.

The Saloon at Avenue House in 1934

photo courtesy of Country Life

While many of the rooms shown in Mr. Cornforth's book are beautiful, the image of the Saloon took my breath away when I first saw it and still gives me a frisson of excitement whenever I come across it to this day.  Sir Albert was a true connoisseur and collected many of the furnishings for the Saloon specifically for the room, as opposed to bringing them from other houses that he already owned.  So there is a uniformity of taste and style, rigor perhaps, to the Saloon that is not seen in rooms where the assembled furnishings are more diverse or "eclectic", a word much overused in decorating circles in our day.

According to Mr. Cornforth's book, Sir Albert acquired Avenue House in 1919 and spent the better part of twenty years furnishing it.  And furnishing it he did, exquisitely, with supreme taste and restraint--the true hallmarks of elegance.  While the photographed interior is lovely to look at (the quality of Country Life's mid-twentieth-century photography is mesmerizing), the black-and-white image does not convey the room's color scheme, which, according to Country Life, was as follows: "A greenish grey carpet covers the floor, and grey, too is the colour of the walls, in contrast to which is the purple taffeta, with old-gold filigree used for the window hangings, and the yellow chenille of old French pattern used for some of the chair coverings..."  How I would love to see color images of this room.

So what is it about the Saloon at Avenue House that so vividly speaks to me?

• It is finely proportioned, with high ceilings, handsome plasterwork, and large windows;
• In it hangs a lovely, appropriately scaled chandelier;
• The furnishings are from a narrow band of time, drawn from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, so they are not slavishly in only one style or period; they include a mix of Regency and earlier furnishings;
• There is plenty of airspace and breathing room.  Sir Albert had the luxury of space to furnish the Saloon sparely and appropriately for a drawing room devoted to entertaining and congenial pursuits;
• The furnishings and architecture are arranged symmetrically and with balance;
• The furniture is attennuated and leggy, which gives the room a light appearance--all "en pointe;"
• The seating is easily movable, to provide for intimate groupings and diverse purposes, the signature of a successful drawing room.  There are no stationary to-the-floor upholstered club chairs or Lawson sofas to lower the room's sight lines or confine the occupants to one place.  This is appealling to me because we have also furnished our (much smaller and far less grand) drawing room at Darlington House in a similar manner, with no fully upholstered seating.  While I don't object to entirely upholstered chairs and sofas, I prefer them in more intimate rooms devoted to cozier pursuits; 
• Most of the furniture is painted, rather than stained and varnished.  Painted furniture is most pleasing in drawing rooms, I believe, as it is pretty and less serious-looking than brown wood furniture, which is more appropriate in dining rooms and libraries.  Much of the seating in our drawing room at Darlington is also painted, but--unlike the Saloon at Avenue House--ours is mostly Louis XVI, with only a smattering of Sir Albert's English Regency;
• There are large, plate-glass mirrors over the fireplace and between the windows.  I have a weakness for mirrors in rooms, and large ones in particular when the room's proportions allow for them.  Mirrors, when used such as Sir Albert does, lend a light and fresh appearance to the rooms in which they hang;
• The floor is covered with a large, single-color, velvet carpet, providing a unifying and visually serene base for the furniture.  I think that there is a tendency today to believe carpets should have some pattern in them, to create "visual interest" (another much over-used expression) in rooms and to avoid the dreaded broadloom "wall-to-wall" carpet look of the 1960s and 70s.  It is noteworthy that our forebears had other views, as pieced carpets such as Sir Albert's were quite expensive and luxurious in their day, bearing little resemblance, when examined closely, to the more modern and degraded versions for sale in today's big-box retailers;
• The curtains are plain and unfussified, with neither swags nor jabots.  My only complaint with them is that I wish the valances had been placed a foot higher on the wall, above the windows, rather than hanging down over them.  As in Canon Valpy's drawing room, my first and previous "Reggie's Rooms" subject, Sir Albert's curtains lack any extraneous upholsterer's tricks, relying on the beauty of their materials rather than bows or gimgracks. 

The Saloon at Avenue House in 1922

photo courtesy of Country Life

But it was nearly 10 years later when I first came across this earlier photograph of the same room that I truly came to appreciate what Sir Albert had wrought at Avenue House.  And how fortunate we are that Country Life chronicled the Saloon's transformation from an under-furnished, almost raw, and obviously only-recently-moved-into space into the beautiful swan that it became over the twelve years of Sir Albert's careful attention.  It is in examining, comparing, and studying these two photographs that we come to fully appreciate Sir Albert's academically grounded genius.  (It also appears that the curtains faded considerably in the period between when these photographs were taken.)

Almost all of the rooms we see today in books and magazines (and now on the blogs) are presented as fully realized and "done," giving no indication of the thought, effort, and consideration that went into creating them.  Seeing a room's transformation over time, as we do here with the Saloon,  is a rarity and a treat, and something of great interest to those of us who enjoy the pleasures (and dare I say "process") of interior decoration.  What else would explain the enduring popularity of the "Before and After"--or, as Boy and I call them, the "During and Done"--issues of the often odious Architectural Digest magazine?

I believe that the Saloon at Avenue House is a room that merits careful study and has much to teach us today regarding placement, proportion, symmetry, and purpose.  It is one of my most-admired interiors and has been one of the inspirations for the furnishing of our more modest drawing room at Darlington House.

Reggie, interrupted

Reggie is having difficulties with his computer.  He hopes to remedy what ails it shortly, and looks forward to posting again, soon.

Please stay tuned . . .