I love what I do.  I am grateful that I make people smile by creating spaces of refinement, warmth, and comfort.  I like to think of it as creating a classic life.  Style icon Jackie Kennedy once said:

Jackie Kennedy

“My mother and mother-in-law were always decorating and redecorating.  I cannot stand that.  I want the things I love around me in the same place  they’ve always been.”  In many ways that is the  key to the classic life—carefully choosing, collecting and surrounding ourselves with the things we love—items of enduring quality, patina and design—integrated into now, today.   Coco Chanel had an incredible way of  sizing things up as well. 

Coco Chanel

I love when she said, “Innovation! One cannot be forever innovating.  I want to create classics.”  What is the Litmus test for creating a classic life?  Choosing timeless, inspiring and motivating objets d’art, furnishings, moldings, books, treasures from nature, dinnerware, sterling, wall coverings, lighting, flowers, trees, fountains, cars, fabrics, timepieces, porcelains, luggage, and so much more.  My dear friend Lady Henrietta Spencer-Churchill is a wonderful designer and encourager.  She said “Collections cannot be formed overnight and few of us are lucky enough to inherit an instant home, and anyway, half the fun in building a collection is the ‘hunt’ and the challenge involved, whether buying at markets, at auctions or in antique shops.”

Lady Henrietta Spencer-Churchill at Blenheim Castle

Are you ready to create your Classic Life?  Please stay tuned as I share favorites from my Design Diary and that of tastemakers around the globe. We will reveal important shopping spots (real and virtual), books, architects, designers, artists and the Top Ten Classics in each classic category.   And we’re expecting you to be a part of this, by sending your images and up-to-the-minute use/placement of the timeless pieces in your life!  Please subscribe to my blog by clicking on Follow in the right hand sidebar of this page, and follow us on  Twitter@billstubbsmol, Like our FB Fan Page ! 

Classically yours, Bill