I deeply believe that a beautiful decor can have a beneficial influence on our lives.

Decoration is really about creating a quality of life, and a beauty in that life that nourishes the soul, that makes life beautiful.

So many young decorators are trying to reinvent the wheel, and the results are sometimes very dubious. They're striving to do things that have never been done before. Quite often it is done without authority, without knowledge, and without a background in taste. They need to be educated about the past, and they need a richer vocabulary.

Flair-a primitive kind of style-may be innate, but I think knowledgeable taste is learned, the result of travel, experience, living, education.

When Van Truex defined the difference between designing and decorating, he used the analogy of preparing a roast of beef. Design, he said, is the preparation and cooking; decorating is the final seasoning, the savoring.

Decorating is not about making stage sets, it's not about making pretty pictures for the magazines, it's really about creating a quality of life, a beauty that nourishes the soul.

Deep downy upholstery is absolutely what I've always been about.