BOOK END No18

“Nothing is so beautiful as spring. The glassy pear tree leaves and blooms, they brush / the descending blue; that blue is all in a rush / with richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.”

– Gerard Manley Hopkins –

Spring is palpably in the air so here is a fresh selection by A-Gent of Style of noteworthy publications.

Don’t forget you can hover your cursor over each image to see the rest of the book cover or click on the image to see the cover in full in a new window.

And if you’ve missed the previous instalments of Book End, you can catch up and see the other fantastic books A-Gent of Style selected over the months:Book End No1, Book End No2, Book End N03, Book End N04, Book End No5, Book End No6, Book End No7, Book End N08, Book End No9, Book End No10, Book End N011, Book End N012, Book End N013, Book End No14, Book End N015, Book End No16, Book End N017

Happy reading!

RIP JAIME PARLADE: GREAT SENOR of DECORACION

  – Jaime Parladé : “This southern gentleman, with the disdain of a Dandy, enslaves his clients like a gigolo. He is the person that gives splendour to the houses of the powerful. Distilling the Spanish Country House Ideal at Alcuzcuz in Andalusia (Spain)” – Raul del Pozo, El Mundo, August 2007

If it wasn’t for Helen Cormack, A-Gent of Style must admit he wouldn’t have heard last week of the death of Jaime Parladé. Actually, if it hadn’t been for Helen herself citing Parladé as one of her favourite decorators in her interview on this blog almost two years ago, A-Gent of Style might not have come across the discreet Spanish decorator altogether. Shameful revelation. And Jaime Parladé deserves to be lauded.

Very little if hardly anything has been mentioned in the English press and social media about Parladé’s death a fortnight ago, and the only few tributes have been mostly from the Spanish press or tweets. If you Google Parladé’s name, there is little to be found about his death and not much information in fact about his life and distinguished career. There is however a short biography on his website but no photos of his projects.No mean feat for A-Gent of Style who was looking for clues to do his research for a feature celebrating the talented señor. There was however the brilliant monogram Jaime Parladé, A Personal Style that A-Gent of Style could rely on, a must for every decorating aficionado.

Jaime Parladé, Marques of Apezteguia, who has been dubbed “the doyen of Spanish designers” by Architectural Digest magazine, and whose English wife, Janetta, has links to the Bloomsbury Group, decorated homes for the most distinguished families in Europe, including the Rothschilds, the Bismarcks and the Duchess of Alba.

Jaime Parladé’s interiors have somehow been a revelation to A-Gent of Style as they have proved to be a great visual exercise for relaxed, unpretentious yet considered decorating mixing English comfort, French refinement and ‘the grace and delicacy of Andalusia’. Whilst the rooms he decorated can seem exuberant at times, dare I say it overcrowded, they all provide a sense of comfort and calm, and they undeniably look like inviting, lived-in spaces. His talent laid in mixing an eclectic selection of furniture and objects accumulated through his lifetime and inherited from his ancestors. It would be fair to say that Parladé was also a master of colours, a daring one at that, who wouldn’t bat an eyelid at painting adjacent walls and furniture with bright, garish, contrasting colours, to great success. A-Gent of Style particularly relished his treatment of ceilings and the way he tended to paint beams in all sorts of vivid colours.

So, today we pay homage to a great decorator of the 20th century who, despite keeping himself ‘under the radar’ and coming from an ‘old school’ generation of decorators eschewing the limelight, is leaving behind him an inspiring, brilliant and colourful legacy.

BOOK END No17

Here is a new selection by A-Gent of Style of noteworthy publications as 2014 comes to an end. Perfect Christmas stocking fillers.

Don’t forget you can hover your cursor over each image to see the rest of the book cover or click on the image to see the cover in full in a new window.

All books are available or can be ordered from The Bookshop at the Design Centre Chelsea Harbour +44 (0) 20 7351 6854 / @theBOOKSHOPat

And if you’ve missed the previous instalments of Book End, you can catch up and see the other fantastic books A-Gent of Style selected over the months:Book End No1, Book End No2, Book End N03, Book End N04, Book End No5, Book End No6, Book End No7, Book End N08, Book End No9, Book End No10, Book End N011, Book End N012, Book End N013, Book End No14, Book End N015, Book End No16.

Happy reading!