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Cecil Beaton at Home: An Interior Life
Cecil Beaton (1904 1980) was one of twentieth- century Britain s Renaissance men: photographer, costume designer, set designer, playwright, creator of fashion fabrics, and writer on raffine interiors and the personalities who inhabited them. He also happened to be a fine interior decorator. Cecil Beaton at Home focuses on two homes dear to Beaton s heart Ashcombe House, near the Wiltshire village of Tollard Royal, and Reddish House, located in Broad Chalke, another village in the same county as well as London's Pelham Place and Beaton s New York hotel suites. Simultaneously a retreat, an inspiration, a photographer s studio, and a stage for impressive entertaining, Beaton s country homes also fuelled his passion for art, gardening, and delight in village life. Against his often-extravagant interiors, Beaton s private life unfolds his unique talent for self-promotion, desire for theatricality, and uncertain pursuit of love. This lavishly illustrated visual biography brings together original photographs, artworks, and possessions from his interiors to present an intimate picture of Beaton s extraordinary life.
368 pages, Hardcover
Published October 25, 2016
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February 6, 2025
Ginger has focused his biography on Beaton's career as an interior designer, providing a detailed examination of his homes and work for clients. Beaton often used his own homes and apartments as the background for his photography work for Vogue and other clients.
It was interesting to see the development of Beaton’s style over his lifetime, and Ginger explores the themes, furniture and materials that Beaton used. The biography starts with Beaton’s childhood homes and family life, and how this Edwardian upbringing influenced and inspired his creations throughout his professional career, including his famous work on costume and set design for My Fair Lady and Lady Windermere’s Fan.
There is a sense of melancholia and bittersweet memories throughout the book. Beaton was part of the group sometimes known as the Bright Young Things, part of the interwar generation, and he had hosted fanciful and playful parties at his rented Ashcombe home in Wiltshire with the creative and privileged set.
This all changed during WW2 and those innocent and youthful days ended. Beaton's house was requisitioned by the armed forces during the war, and it suffered accidental bomb damage. Beaton was then forced to give the house back to the owners in 1945, he had put much of himself into developing Ashcombe, and his despair was that he had no right to keep it.
The book touches on the importance of Beaton’s love affairs, with two being long-lasting and impactful. He had a long and complicated relationship with Greta Garbo, who he had long admired and wished to marry, but she was distant and appeared unwilling to commit. He also fell for Kinmont Hoitsma, a younger man studying to be a lecturer in art history in San Francisco and found that their lives were incompatible once Kin moved to London.
Beaton emerges from the biography as a talented and creative soul who worked very hard to get to his position and had a unique style perspective. Taste is highly subjective, as Beaton knew, and he wanted to keep breaking what good taste meant to broaden and embrace more possibilities. He knew that taste had a shelf life and that certain styles would not last, and this is shown through his period of loving rococo and then rejecting it completely for a pared-down and spartan existence, before combining elements of both to create a new style again. His love of colour, texture and use of light is expansive.
This biography was interesting for 20th-century history and I would recommend it for those into interior design and the creative process.
It was interesting to see the development of Beaton’s style over his lifetime, and Ginger explores the themes, furniture and materials that Beaton used. The biography starts with Beaton’s childhood homes and family life, and how this Edwardian upbringing influenced and inspired his creations throughout his professional career, including his famous work on costume and set design for My Fair Lady and Lady Windermere’s Fan.
There is a sense of melancholia and bittersweet memories throughout the book. Beaton was part of the group sometimes known as the Bright Young Things, part of the interwar generation, and he had hosted fanciful and playful parties at his rented Ashcombe home in Wiltshire with the creative and privileged set.
This all changed during WW2 and those innocent and youthful days ended. Beaton's house was requisitioned by the armed forces during the war, and it suffered accidental bomb damage. Beaton was then forced to give the house back to the owners in 1945, he had put much of himself into developing Ashcombe, and his despair was that he had no right to keep it.
The book touches on the importance of Beaton’s love affairs, with two being long-lasting and impactful. He had a long and complicated relationship with Greta Garbo, who he had long admired and wished to marry, but she was distant and appeared unwilling to commit. He also fell for Kinmont Hoitsma, a younger man studying to be a lecturer in art history in San Francisco and found that their lives were incompatible once Kin moved to London.
Beaton emerges from the biography as a talented and creative soul who worked very hard to get to his position and had a unique style perspective. Taste is highly subjective, as Beaton knew, and he wanted to keep breaking what good taste meant to broaden and embrace more possibilities. He knew that taste had a shelf life and that certain styles would not last, and this is shown through his period of loving rococo and then rejecting it completely for a pared-down and spartan existence, before combining elements of both to create a new style again. His love of colour, texture and use of light is expansive.
This biography was interesting for 20th-century history and I would recommend it for those into interior design and the creative process.
Displaying 1 of 1 review