Books. Sofa. Streep. Lauren. Canonero. Poiret.

A quick minute to think about the intersection and origination of fashion + interior design: clothing lines + home lines. Musing thusly, of course, leads anyone smack into Karen Blixen's house and onto Ralph's brilliance...via, of course, the incandescent Meryl Streep, clothed - thanks to the genius of Milena Canonero - in one of the greatest cinematic wardrobes we'll see in our lifetimes. Hats off to Paul Poiret, who (see below) started it all (and to the fact that I finally ended that last sentence...it's been a long day).

"With all of Poiret’s accomplishments, the greatest obstacle he faced may simply have been his timing. For if Poiret’s debut marked the opening of an era, the curtain call for his encore would not come again until the near close of the twentieth century. And, then almost as if taking their cues directly from the King of Fashion himself, contemporary fashion designers emerged as total arbiters of taste. Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, Giorgio Armani, and the late Gianni Versace were among some of the first to expand their clothing lines to encompass home lines."

Laura Layfer, Antiques and Fine Art

'Paul Poiret: Furnishing the Fashion Industry'

Poiret Room: Domino Magazine

Ralph Lauren Sofa: Apartment Therapy

Meryl Streep: 'Out of Africa,' Milena Canonero

Atelier Martine: Abricot

Atelier Martine | Paul Poiret

Abricot 

(probably from a Martine design) 

adapted by Thomas Jayne.

Brunschwig & Fils.

Paul Poiret

Paul Poiret

"...Poiret, in contrast to his predecessors Doucet and Worth, equated his actual vocation with that of artists’ work. The onset of the couture profession alone had elevated the status of clothing to a form of artistic expression as the attribution of designs to designers was itself a major advancement for fashion in the late nineteenth century. Poiret, on the other hand, took it one step further. If couture transformed the assemblage of outfits from mere decorative coverage to a medium in which to express the tastes and desires of its makers and wearers, then Poiret sought to cultivate those aspirations into a reality.

In 1908, Poiret asked the illustrator Paul Iribe to assist in producing a limited edition catalogue entitled Les robes de Paul Poiret. This colorful 'look book' featured Poiret’s clothing set against elaborate art-filled rooms, and single-handedly established the importance of the decorative interior as the ideal home for fashion creations..."

Laura Layfer, Antiques and Fine Art:

Paul Poiret: Furnishing the Fashion Industry

Plates from Les choses de Paul Poiret vues par Georges Lepape