Billy Baldwin Remembers [INSCRIBED]

Billy Baldwin.

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. New York and London. 1974. First edition. Inscribed to John Cornforth on the half-title in red ink - 'For dear John. With boundless admiration. Billy Baldwin'. Hardback; grey cloth-bound boards, dust jacket. 232 pages. Over 100 photographs in colour and b&w. English. 285 x 225mm. 1.2kg. 0151120706. Very good, in very good dust jacket; light shelf wear to jacket, light ruffling to spine ends, not price-clipped. With the ex libris bookplate of John Cornforth to front pastedown and his blind stamp to title-page.

Part memoir, part decorating masterclass, Billy Baldwin Remembers is filled with the decorator's reminiscences from his years of decorating for America's elite. He takes us through his work and meetings with Greta Garbo, Cole Porter, Babe Paley, Diana Vreeland, Jackie Kennedy, etc. For all the highs, there are many lows, with grim tales of difficult clients and impossible demands. The stories are balanced with decorating hints and tips, as well as photographs of Baldwin's completed projects. From the library of the architectural historian John Cornforth, warmly inscribed to him by Baldwin and with his bookplate.