Object Lesson

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“If you’re a creative person, there are certain spaces that just feel right to you— you just kind of feel the energy.” —Stacey Bendet

In our annual September Style issue, we aim to deliver a feast of creative types, and indeed the energy in these pages is palpable. With such great expectations, I must confess, it is a challenge to make sure we outdo ourselves each year.

So, when AD’s global entertainment director, Dana Mathews, informed me that actor Sienna Miller owns a 16th-century cottage in Buckinghamshire, England, I could not have imagined a more utterly charming house. After leaving the storybook structure pretty much untouched for more than a decade, Miller embarked upon a COVID-era restoration and decoration project with her close friend, director Gaby Dellal. The resulting interiors— warm, cozy, romantic—look and feel completely natural, as if they have always been that way. Says Miller of Dellal’s sensitive handiwork: “I could not believe the transformation… arriving to see this meadow in front of the house planted with wildflowers, I started to cry.”

Emotions run high for other homeowners featured this month, too: Best-selling author and Project Runway judge Elaine Welteroth writes with humor and wisdom about the highs and lows of relocating from the East Coast to the West, undertaking extensive renovation on her dream home, and giving birth—all at the same time, during a pandemic. And while fashion designer Stacey Bendet, founder of Alice + Olivia, lives with her husband and three daughters in palatial grandeur in New York City’s legendary Dakota building, there is nothing stuffy about her ultra-colorful, family-friendly style. “I didn’t want a big apartment that was made for adults and where you couldn’t jump on the sofa,” says Bendet. “My kids do cartwheels and flips in here. I wanted it to feel lived in.” And it does—complete with Venetian chandeliers, heroically scaled artworks by Julian Schnabel and Francesco Clemente, and three distinctly different children’s rooms, each a tour de force of fiercely individual decorating and full of positive energy.

Challenge met.

AMY ASTLEY Global Editorial Director and Editor in Chief, AD U.S. @amyastley

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1. STACEY BENDET AND ONE OF HER THREE DAUGHTERS IN THEIR NYC APARTMENT. 2. SIENNA MILLER STRIKES A POSE OUTSIDE HER ENGLISH COUNTRY HOUSE. 3. ELAINE WELTEROTH AND HER HUSBAND, MUSICIAN JONATHAN SINGLETARY, WITH THEIR NEWBORN SON AT HOME IN L.A. 4. DEE AND TOMMY HILFIGER IN PALM BEACH. 5. LAURE HERIARD DUBREUIL, OF THE WEBSTER, IN HER L.A. HOME OFFICE. 6. FASHION DESIGNER JOSEPH ALTUZARRA (RIGHT) AND HIS HUSBAND, SETH WEISSMAN, WITH THEIR DAUGHTER AND DOG AT THEIR HAMPTONS HOUSE.

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How Hans Wegner’s 1950 Flag Halyard chair became a 21st-century style icon

t was 1949 and Danish designer Hans Wegner was at the

Ibeach, digging himself into the sand with a shovel. When he found the perfect lean-back position for seaside repose, he set out to make it in something more sturdy. Enter: the Flag Halyard chair, a steel frame wrapped in rope commonly used for flagpoles.

The ergonomic, spaceship-like form, later cozied up with sheepskin, provided a comfortable lounge that allowed the sitter to assume a range of positions. Wegner’s own included two side pillows, in addition to the hallmark neck rest.

Unveiled in Copenhagen in 1950 at an exhibition at the

Designmuseum Danmark, the design received mixed reviews.

Kaare Klint famously likened it to something from a gynecologist’s office. But from the jump, fashion people fawned. It was splashed across magazines, models posing on its tightly wound string seat.

The chair was difficult to make. For several decades it was manufactured by Danish brand Getama in small quantities. In the late ’80s it went out of production altogether. “It was ahead of its time,” says Kasper Holst Pedersen, the third-generation owner of

Danish furniture maker PP Møbler, which picked up production of the chair (now retailing from $16,048) in 2000. “But for 10 or 15 years, it’s been one of our top products in almost every market.”

Today lounge-ability is the major selling point. “It’s not super comfortable for socializing,” says stylist Kate Young, who lives with one in Woodstock, New York. “Better for lolling or reading.”

Interior designer Fawn Galli says she often places them in screening rooms. As Jennifer Bunsa puts it (the designer lives with one in Miami), “It’s a chair for ultimate relaxation.” pp.dk

—HANNAH MARTIN