The Dean of Decorator

Don't forget to check out my first ever guest post at Susanne's blog, Kegle99, here. Hope you like it :)

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A few months ago, I bought a book about interior decoration. On the first chapter, I found a quote by someone named Billy Baldwin. It was this

And I suddenly felt in love with that. I mean, it’s totally true right? So I was curious, who is this Billy Baldwin? Then I googled ‘Billy Baldwin’ and all I found is about an actor whose name is just the same.

But then, a couple days ago, I was trying to find some interior design quotes, and I found many lovely quotes that were from the same person, Mr. Billy Baldwin. Obviously, he’s well known in interior design industry. I got even more curious and I googled ‘Billy Baldwin interior designer’, then finally, I found some infos about him.

Billy Baldwin (1903-1984) was a very famous American interior designer/decorator in 20th century. He was at once a classicist and a modernist. He is the man who gave us the slipper chair and brass bookcase.

His style is elegant, simple, and practical. This style became defined as American style. Every spaces he decorated were both beautiful and comfortable. He once said ‘Interior Design is the art of arranging beautiful things, comfortably’. He designed his rooms a long time ago, but they’re still loved. I think we can conclude that his designs are timeless.

He believed that a room should have a personal connection with the owner, that’s why he liked to keep some old furnitures of the owner . He didn’t decorate a room with some furnitures just because those furnitures are beautiful, but because his clients and him do love it. He said ‘Be faithful to your own taste because nothing you really like is ever out of style.’ And also ‘Stick to the things you really love. An honest room is always up to date.’

I’ve mentioned some of the lovely quotes from Mr. Baldwin, now let me tell you a quote about him. This is from Adam Lewis, the author of ‘Billy Baldwin : The Great American Decorator”. And it’s...

‘Billy Baldwin did for decorating what Chanel did for fashion.’

ps : I really need an inspiration to finish my work right now. Hope it will come to me soon!