Mud on the tires: A seating chart after my heart

The multi-table seating charts for a recent wedding as created by Bellinter House, Co. Meath, Ireland for a girl who, not unlike me, has spent her life kicking around in a hunt field. Well done and best wishes from these hunt fields to those of their future...



Photos: Jeni Glasgow

Newport musings: Part 1

Researching a recent post on my pal Chandler in Newport, I took a moment to revisit some of my favorite things about Castle Hill and why, if I were hosting an event in Newport, Castle Hill Inn would be my first choice: As it also is for drinks on the hill, Sunday brunch, lunch and dinner; or for a place to celebrate the start of the moving and magnificent bi-annual Newport Bermuda Race as the regatta vessels arrive at the starting line at Castle Hill lighthouse (stay tuned for a Part 2 where I tell professional sporting spectators like myself everything you need to know on that topic), and for virtually every reason I can think of to be out of the house, frankly.

If you are visiting, even if you do not plan to stay at the Inn, I suggest making certain you get a chance to enjoy a cocktail or lunch on the hill. And if you are considering staying or marrying there, below is a bit of what you have to look forward to while enjoying the same views Jackie Kennedy did while spending summers at Hammersmith Farm, just a couple of steps away...

Now, admittedly, I am a Northeastern baby and I am partial to a tradtional nautical style and summery spots where you still need a sweater to protect you from the occasionally chilly ocean breezes. This is my Newport... every time I see these rooms and I imagine the summer breeze on hill through the windows it seems a room could not get any more perfect than these.

Today's funerals: The Father of a Friend and Decorum

The Father of good friend died earlier this week. I have just arrived home from his moving and thoughtful memorial service. It was exceedingly well-done by the three generations preceding him. He was a man well-loved by our North Salem and I was glad to see such a gesture and turn-out.

I never met the gentlemen, but I know his children and grandchildren, finer people I may never meet. I can imagine no better testament nor more telling a sign of the decent person he was than the quality of his family: Extraordinary. I truly believe that I do not need to see every corner of your home to know what kind of man you are, and I am certain that when the measure of this one is taken, he will not be found lacking in any way.

For him, for the kind of man I understood him to be, for the kind of friend his son and his girlfriend, my dear friend Jennifer, are, I rose early this morning. I prepared good black clothing, a long coat, and carefully did my hair and makeup. I made sure the doctor's appointment of this morning would not cause me to be late to the service or even cut close. I was in my seat ten minutes before the appointed hour because these people, the lives they led and have lead, and their loss, is important to me. I want always to be respectful and careful. I was pleased to see any number of people who felt the same.

Then there were the others: Jeans, old sneakers, things that looked for all the world like pajamas, all made multiple appearances in the packed house. There is no excuse for appearing this way at a funeral: Change in the car if you have to but make your last visit to the man's side one for which you made a demonstrative effort to respect the life he lived. The quality of his days was not a sweat-pant affair and indeed no life is one truly. Besides being a person worthy of your trip over to the church today, they are also creations of a mighty and perfect force (whichever one you subscribe to) which also deserves respect when its finest work goes on home.

Please. Wear black or very dark colors to funerals, still. I know girls down south who wisely have a funeral suit or dress and shoes for every season. Ever ready, those organized types.

And by the same token, even at night, black is still inappropriate at weddings (Be advised: Many cultures see this as a reverent mourning color and Grandmother does not care at all that you come from a big city where they do that all the time.), doesn't matter that it is white tie, in the dead of a winter night somewhere in Saskatchewan, it is not appropriate. Period. The Save-the-Date card seems to show up earlier with each passing wedding, does it not? Why, you have a year's notice, in some cases, to find a dress of the correct length which is not black or have one made.

Just get it done. There are no excuses: Begin scouring thrift shops now for some great $10 vintage items if you want to save a bit. Here is one I found this past week at the ladies club where my Mother gives her time, good for an evening wedding: A dark gold on gold, probably from the 50's, and memorably fabulous with a short sleeve pleated hem cape-like jacket over a matching sheath dress.

Both pieces were $50. Killer beautiful.

For a funeral, don't be too much of a fashion plate, this is not about you. If you never dress understated: Learn. Fast. You don't need to look like a frump but you do need to exercise restraint. By the same token, if you ordinarily present yourself as "casual" (which could, dangerously, be all in your mind when you actually remind those who you know of Mrs. Van Astor's pet goat. Best to ask your Mother for the cold truth.), you will need to make an effort: Get rid of that bed head, get your hair blown out by a professional and maybe get over to the mall and let the cosmetic people make up your face. No excuses.

For a funeral, the below will do in any season. Wear a shaped jacket or sweater over either for colder weather under a long coat:

Tory Burch, The Duncan Dress


Theory, The Betty Tailor Dress

Gentlemen and masters of any age going to weddings and funerals alike: Kindly put on a suit which fits, with a tie over a pressed shirt, no matter what your buddy is doing. Be sure your hair and nails are tidy, and polish your dress shoes.

Sweat pant-wearers: Bow your heads and ask our dearly passed on and newly married for forgiveness.

Destined

When Josh and I were engaged, we briefly entertained the idea of a semi-destination wedding for ourselves and our guests who would be traveling largely from the New York and Boston areas, with the exception of Josh's immediate family traveling from the mid-west. We booked the Eisenhower House in Newport, Rhode Island and local church for August 14, 2003.

The tented-wedding-in-high-summer scenario got the best of me and I lay awake for three nights fretting over the caterer's stories of outdoor wedding mishaps. Then we cancelled in Newport and began the search anew, here at home in the Hudson Valley. My Brother went on to have the wedding and tented reception at the Eisenhower House in 2007; they have stronger entertaining nerves than I did then. It was lovely, not a drop of rain in site.

I would not change the places at which our wedding events occurred for all the world. I still find the majestic architectural beauty, unparalleled views, and the staggering power of all the history that has occurred, been educated, and have yet to arrive at West Point, a singularly moving and nearly otherworldly experience. We were blessed, truly, to have been welcomed at West Point even as we were to become a Navy family, and our friends there facilitated a perfect compromise: The West Point marriage of a daughter of this commanding and resplendent river valley and a military man of a now rare and dignified order. In the fall - as bespoke all my favorite Hudson River School paintings. No. I would not change a thing. That is my valley, no better place on earth for me.


But weddings and what drives them to individual perfection are as different as snowflakes. And my capacity here is to consider all manner of entertaining, all brand and stamp of beauty. I promise to do so, however, I am bored to tears with beach wedding photos, and not even for you, my prized compatriots, will I conduct any even half-interested cataloging of places where one must struggle on sand with wispy hair-do's to get to the ceremony. I cannot even point you to the hostess who will review this for you at this point; I think many have had their fill for the moment. It will come back around one day soon, but, for now, let's go some place else, shall we?

Say... Yorkshire? United Kingdom. One could be married at Carlton Towers. Sounds modern, yes? Reminds me of the new residence tower in Boston but it is nothig like it, obviously:


This is a marvelous place for horsey and hunt types: Equestrian events, falconry,
heliocopter trips...


The Picture Gallery, Carlton Towers, Yorkshire, UK

There are fifteen guest rooms or so (5 ready in 2009), and the Carlton family continues to live in house as well. You might care to stay in the The Old School Room
"A capacious four poster bedroom with four windows overlooking both the park and rose gardens."

City kitty? Florence has to be one of my favorite cities in the world, while I cannot say enough good about the Hotel Lungarno, it is not set up for weddings of more than a few guests. The Grand Hotel Firenze, on the other hand...

And what an enchanted place for breakfast the morning after your Florentine wedding.


Lake Geneva, Switzerland, possibly? This is the singular Chateau de Chillon






The roof deck of the glittering Four Seasons Singapore, cosmopolitan and exotic all at once:

Finally, and in finale, one of the most beautiful hotels in the world and a place I haunted mightily not long ago, and will again:

The "gentle breeze", the magnificent Raffles Hotel Singapore.

In the course of my professional and personal travels, I've been in more hotel rooms than the Gideon bible in more towns than I could name without a globe before me. I am here to tell you, you will live a long life packing and unpacking as I have and never find a hotel which is as aesthetically pleasing, historically relevant, architecturally dominant, or as adept at the "gentle breeze" of hotel service, perhaps invented at, but certainly perfected by, Raffles: Naturally, they know your name and are expecting you, but somehow, visit after visit, they have observed and quietly learned your preferences and tastes for all things: I only ever had to waive cream and sugar away from a coffee service once over five years of breakfasts there, and only had to mention just once that I preferred to sit on the sunny side of a room, and stay on the Palm Court side of the hotel. "Hotel magic," the hospitality schools call it. Call it magic if you want to, but it is one that is not shared by all five star hotels and which eludes the Four Seasons and Ritz hotels. If you choose to have an event at the Four Seasons Singapore because the roof is so amazing, it is still best to secure rooms at Raffles. For accommodations, the two are not in the same, or even neighboring, leagues.

While there, you should visit the Long Bar Steakhouse where Frank Cavendish the Malaysian planter and British national, one of so many notable guests, came to Raffles to find a bit of peace and luxury every weekend. At the hotel, where he relaxed with a Whiskey Stengah (a British colonial favorite of half whiskey, half soda water) and the Long Bar Steakhouse menu remains dedicated in part to his preferences (Dilly Bread, aged steaks, Lyonnais potatoes among others); Cavendish, said to be a notoriously handsome and reclusive chap, met a young woman with whom he had a brief fling while she visited Raffles. To this day, it is mentioned with a sense of sadness by the staff and guests alike that the young woman, a novelist, went on to write a book about their affair at the hotel. Thus bringing both Cavendish and Raffles a seeming endless stream of curiosity seekers until the end of Cavendish's life. He hardly had a peaceful weekend at his sanctuary again.

If you know the hotel, you can surely see how our young novelist must have been taken with her surroundings and the gentleman planter with a regular weekend suite. The spot has lost none of the romantic glow she found there at the turn of the century.

While it would be lovely to have a wedding ceremony outdoors in the Palm Court, incase of inclement weather, there is a lovely alternative: Juliblee Hall.


You'll have some talented stylists for help with your event. This is some of their work:


The hotel is entirely suites. This could be your parlor, I can almost feel Cavendish's spirit lingering in here:


And you can lay your head in the bedroom of the same room. What an enchanting place to awake on your wedding day:


Drop by the spa, for a treatment and a nap here - you'll need your rest:

Before you leave, be sure you have a Singapore Sling and a Stengah in the Long Bar where they were both invented. While there, you can throw peanut shells on the floor because unlike the rest of Singpore, you will not be fined $500 for doing so. And then move on to the Steakhouse for an outstanding meal with a decidedly masculine appeal or to Raffles Grill:

I love a good destination-hotel wedding. Makes everything seamless for those of us traveling a great distance.

Congratulations to all those newly engaged this season. Your grandest host and hostess moment lay squarely before you. I know you'll be fabulous. But should you feel challenged, you can always refer to these outstanding wedding blogs for inspiration:

What Junebug Loves

Snippet and Ink

Modern Vintage

Style Me Pretty