A Fashionable Home
The press team at Gucci must be working over time since creative director Frida Giannini's Italian Villa has just been featured in March InStyle magazine and April Harper's Bazaar. But I don't mind since it looks beautiful. I love sneaking a peak into European homes. They never fail to be sophisticated and elegant. Maybe it's due to the fact that they are filled with family heirlooms and antiques instead of stuff from Pottery Barn and West Elm. Whatever the reason, I think Giannini's home is a wonderfully decorated space and who else could incorporate over 7,000 albums inherited from an uncle looks like art in the sitting room above.
Forgive the terrible scan from InStyle but I couldn't resist including the fabulous 19th-century marble fireplace and the custom bookshelves in the living room.
A 1930's cabinet holds chic art books, blackamoor candle holders and even a Barbie. Nice to see she has a sense of humor. 
"This 1968 Arne Jacobsen Egg chair in original leather took five years to track down. The sideboard is 1930s Italian art deco." 
A 1940s black Murano-glass chandelier pops against the white walls in the dining room that includes a French art deco dining table and chairs. 
A tablescape with coral is temporary composition. "I think a house should always be a work in progress," says the designer.
What would a fashion designer home spread in a magazine be without the requisite product placement, hence the Gucci bag on the fur bedspread in the bedroom with mirrored bed and nightstand.
"In some ways, the master bathroom is the most important room in the house," say Giannini. And with marble walls and a custom Boffi tub, I'd say so too.
You may not be able to afford a $2,000 Gucci handbag but you can certainly take some free decorating advice from the Gucci designer. "There is really no point in having wonderful things if you don't surround yourself with them all the time. That's what makes a house feel warm and safe. And when you feel comfortable in your home, you feel like you can do anything you want to there." Now that's luxury.
Photos by Anders Overgaard for and Oberto Gili
What would a fashion designer home spread in a magazine be without the requisite product placement, hence the Gucci bag on the fur bedspread in the bedroom with mirrored bed and nightstand. 
"In some ways, the master bathroom is the most important room in the house," say Giannini. And with marble walls and a custom Boffi tub, I'd say so too. You may not be able to afford a $2,000 Gucci handbag but you can certainly take some free decorating advice from the Gucci designer. "There is really no point in having wonderful things if you don't surround yourself with them all the time. That's what makes a house feel warm and safe. And when you feel comfortable in your home, you feel like you can do anything you want to there." Now that's luxury.
Photos by Anders Overgaard for and Oberto Gili
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Cary Grant also happens to be in everyone's favorite Hitchcock movie To Catch a Thief where he plays second fiddle to Grace Kelly's cool elegance and perfect wardrobe. The same can be said for Jimmy Stewart who stars with the fashionable Grace Kelly in Rear Window. In fact all the women in Hitchcock movies look impeccable...and blonde. Tippi Hedren wears one outfit for most of The Birds and still manages to look amazing throughout even while under attack. I hear she also looks divine in Marnie, which I have yet to see but am going to add to my queue right now!
It's funny how there are barely any good outfit images online of the most stylish movie of all time, Belle du Jour. The costumes for the film were created a 29 year old Yves Saint Laurent and the famous pilgrim shoes were designed by Roger Vivier and have become fashionable once again. I can't see anyone with their hair pinned half up without thinking of Catherine Deneuve. Tres Chic! An updated example of this type of movie would have to be American Gigolo in which Richard Gere wore exclusively Georgio Armani. And Lauren Hutton looked amazing too. 
The movie that is not only beautiful but is probably responsible for every woman's obsession with Africa has got to be Out of Africa. The outfits, the landscape, Robert Redford and Meryl Streep...what's not to love. My second runner up for travel infused period films would have to be The English Patient. No one could be more beautiful than Kristen Scott Thomas.
Completely different is The Last Days of Disco by writer/director Whit Stillman, who also wrote and directed the cult classic Metropolitan. Both movies deal with the world of preppies and class and I love watching The Last Days of Disco for the outfits. It's funny that some of the most stylish girls starred in this film including Kate Beckinsale, Chloe Sevigny, and Tara Subkoff, the founder of the fashion line Imitation of Christ.
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The last Gwyneth Paltrow movie I have to mention is The Royal Tenenbaums. She gets to wear fab furs and an Hermes Birkin bag but I love Luke Wilson's Bjorn Borg style tennis outfits the best. Quirky doesn't even begin to describe this movie but it's fun.
I love reading biographies of inspiring women like Chanel so I might have to finally finish Axel Madsen's biography 
Mademoiselle Chanel lived at the Ritz but she kept an apartment at 31 Rue Cambon to entertain which is also inspiring as it looks exactly the same today as it did when she was alive! If walls could talk, just imagine the stories they could tell! C'est magnifique! Now if I can just imagine I'm watching a normal channel when the mini-series airs and not Lifetime, I'll be all set! 
