Stanford White: Decorator in Opulence and Dealer in Antiquities
What, other than some magnificent architecture and a scandalous society affair ending in murder, is New Yorker Stanford White to be remembered for? According to University of Delaware professor and author (American Art: History and Culture,1993, for one) Craven, no little talent in the arena of interior design. With much attention to White's European contacts and photographic and written chronicles of the architecture's interior work, Craven documents, some laboriously, the creativity and degree to which White festooned his clients' mansions. The introduction sets the stage for the burgeoning nineteenth- and twentieth-century trade in antiquities: destitute nobles, poorly enforced European laws, and demand for opulent houses from the likes of the Astors, Vanderbilts, and Whitneys, among others. Revealing sources, monies expended, and the decorating innovation behind America's Gilded Age "castles," the author does an admirable job in showcasing not only the talents of White but also the rise of interior design as a profession.Barbara JacobsCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved