Seasonal submergence. My kind of cleanse. Every spring, snowmelt from the Karst mountains in Austria swells the Grüner See (Green Lake), flooding the park that rings the lagoon. For most of the year, visitors can stroll across bridges, sit… Read More
A tiresome day of (tax) tasks leaves me feeling like I’m climbing, always climbing, destination unknown. Instead, I’ll imagine ascending these millennia-old stairs up Huangshan (Yellow Mountain) in the Anhui Province of southeast China, in this… Read More
Rolling the grill out of the garage yesterday fired me up for the charbroiled parade of summer. With meat on my mind, I sought out an exotic outlet for my carnivorous cravings and found this Arcadian jewel in the… Read More
Daylife. Nightlife. Lifestyle. This is the triad encapsulated by Fuglen, a Tokyo outpost which takes the coffee it presses as seriously as the cocktails it shakes and the mid-century finds it sells. The immaculate mix that is Fuglen –… Read More
Over time, wind and weather will erode Desert Breath, a breathtaking land art installation in the eastern Sahara desert. Sited at the meeting of mountains and sea, Desert Breath is a monumental meditation on infinity made by D.A.S.T. Arteam – installation artist Danae Stratou,… Read More
A beach and more books than I could ever read: sounds like an ideal Saturday (as my thermometer stubbornly sticks below zero). The serene scene at The Library boutique hotel in Koh Samui, Thailand pairs the lapping sounds of… Read More
Alchemy is at work in New Orleans in the form of a community arts project called Dithyrambalina. Part sonic playground, part performance venue, part conceptual laboratory, Dithyrambalina nurtures musical architecture in NoLa. What is musical architecture? When community… Read More
Time to unlock my latent talents. If I still lived in Brooklyn, I would beeline for the Textile Arts Center and take a class with one of the rising star designers on the faculty roster. Oh, the… Read More
Seven Park Place at St. James’s Hotel and Club in London.
Cedric Charlier Crinkled Wide Leg Pant in Jaune.
I was named after Katharine Hepburn, a fiery legacy I’ve gladly embraced my whole life. But today, I came across a quote that deepened my sense of the star, widely considered to be the greatest female actor in Hollywood history. In the quotation, Lauren Bacall paints a portrait of her friend layering vulnerability and devotion atop the headstrong hue so widely depicted.
“There was always vivid Kate carrying her broken full length mirror to the set every day in Africa – Kate in tears at the death of friend Fanny Brice – Kate eating peaches out of a can in Africa – cooking for Spence – sitting at his feet keeping his coffee hot while hanging on his every word – Kate holding a small bouquet of flowers my first day home from the hospital with her godson, Sam. Kate was a doer – a worker – a riser above all things – exasperating – intimidating – loyal – funny – loving – sentimental – proud – passionate in her likes and dislikes – a lover of beauty – nature – she was all those things and even more.”
So in honor of Hepburn, I present a vignette inspired by her transcendent spirit: daffodil yellow, menswear-inspired-but-oh-so-feminine crinkled crepe pants worn (in my imagination) inside Seven Park Place, a Michelin-starred restaurant by famed chef William Drabble within St. James’s, a former men’s club now boutique hotel in London. A historically exclusionary space reborn in style, fit for a sparkling feminist.
Another dreamy window seat on a Saturday (perhaps this will become a weekly installment). Plucked from a two-story apartment in Sweden, this light-washed nook is lofted above the living area – the perfect roost for reading. Endearingly disheveled, I… Read More
Wear + Here 