Tasteful Friends: Former Ralph Lauren Stylist Shows Off New York Apartment

How they crammed all of that shit in that apartment; I do not know. And he likes to entertain in that space. Three bedrooms and they turned 2 into closets. What a mess.

I know this guy. When he says "we", he means his wife. Yes, he's married to a woman.

[quote] I know this guy. When he says "we", he means his wife. Yes, he's married to a woman.

Throughout the video he refers to his MALE partner (he). I believe he said his name is Drew. Did you watch the video? He mentions a pile of baseball caps that belong to Drew.

HOLY SHIT that is a lot of detritus in a very small space. I think I almost had a seizure.

Oh MY EYES !!!!! Sleep would be the only peaceful vision, but then one would dream of the ghastly interiors. Oh que the HORROR !

Another low-bred queen trying to come off as gentry/old money. Everything in that hideous ersatz bolt hole is cheap. There’s a way to “do” classic properly and effortlessly and that trap looks cheap, dated and so very forced.

This is much worse than the Rudy Saunders link. I have a problem with someone who describes themselves as a designer and then lives like this. There's no sense of unity- he can't even describe it as maximalist. It's collecting that has become hoarding with lots of jarring themes, colours and patterns. At least with Rudy there was some sense of cohesion in all the clutter, here it's just stuff that the owner should have outgrown but held onto and shoehorns into a space. There are some lovely pieces, but it's lost in a sea of crap. That big ole TV plonked in front of the painting of the couple on horseback is unforgivable. As for the stuffed straw owls from Abercrombie & Fitch.....

I loved it. Yeah to live there, it's a little cramped and crowded. I'd be knocking stuff over but he had a lot of interesting things and a story behind each one.

I can't imagine living in that cramped space with all that shit and a another person

[quote] but he had a lot of interesting things and a story behind each one.

Yes he's a hoarder.

No straight man wears a tied neckerchief.

If he spent as much time on the rest of his wardrobe as he did the neckerchief, he might have looked less of a slob. Was he fired from Ralph Lauren?

Is there a place for chinoiserie, faux Chippendale, Regency period, Dorothy Draper in a modern apartment? Those styles do work together but not in such a confined space. It's a difficult look to pull off in a small footprint.

I don't mind this. It's leagues better than Rudy Whatshissnatch's place with thectwee little cushions and tweet little cupcakes or whatever useless shir he's piled around.

There's too much here. The chaos of color wants a hard eye to make some choices on all the layered tartan and pattern and color...but at least there is some understanding of color, of pattern, and most importantly in opposition to Rudy's little squat, a sense of scale and contrasts. He's bought into the Ralph Lauren bachelor's rooms look too literally and, the bane of too many decorators, thinks that if he throws two things together it's a brilliant triumph, and if he packs a room to the gills, it's Cecil Vyse and Oliver Wilde had a baby sensational. It's not. But de-layer the place even a bit and it's quite salvageable.

His mist egregious crime (and for a gallery wall snob, no less) are cheap frames, bad matting jobs, and anti-reflective glass. Suitable for a too large high school photo on a motorhome wall, but not many other places.). That is his great crime.

He's fun, but for shit's sake I hate his outfit...

I love it. There, I said it. Beautiful and well lived in not all this black and white Minimalist shit I see everywhere. Give me stuff…bright, beautiful stuff from wall to wall. And cover the walls with it too.

The gallery wall doesn't work because that corridor is too narrow to stand back and appreciate the images. In terms of eclecticism, there's no thought gone into the arrangement, they just look like a wall of pictures in a thrift shop.

His clothing looks like someone took a homeless guy's outfit (cast-off Lacoste v-neck from the 90s + stretched out track pants) and added a neckerchief to it.

Seriously, if he was Black and on the subway dressed like that, you all would just assume he was homeless

Ralph Lauren = Ralph Lipschitz.

He needs to call in Rudy Saunders for help editing the space.

It's lovely.

these queens watch to much youtube, and then translate it into these horror vaults, in their crappy little NYC overpriced dumps

Bossy bottom? Moi?!

OMG NOOO R22...he didn't !!!

Terrible, but at least there's more rooms and space on paper than Rudy's digs.

" I can't afford this lovely early 18th century hand-painted miniature minton figurine, but this very sweet vintage plastic Hello Kitty shampoo bottle will do just as fine "

R21, the difference with your guy is that his home is filled with QUALITY pieces. They have a history, the shabby look is authentic and not made to look distressed, the house is also spacious. The problem Americans have is there is a dearth of proper antiques, by which I mean pre 20th Century. The Ralph Lauren guy collects Abercrombie & Fitch toy owls ffs while Rudy collects Swatch watches, 1950s bowties and kitsch. Look at the interior at R21, no zany patterns in acid colours, space for the larger pieces to breath, anything with a chip or a crack is hundreds of years old.

Godawful, cheap, and gaudy.

It must take hours to dust.

[quote] Throughout the video he refers to his MALE partner (he). I believe he said his name is Drew

He said "she" and "Drew" is his wife's name (e.g., like Drew Barrymore).

How many tricks has he had on the tartan bedspread while Drew is at work? And that black neckerchief, he's moved from San Fran to NYC, what does a black handkerchief in the back pocket indicate? He likes the BBCs?

Pictured with Drew Poling. Their names combined would be Poling Wood! 'cause that's what they do all day! ; )

People like him identify as a bottom but then refuse to have anal sex because they think it's "dirty".

we know YOU don't refuse anal sex because it's dirty Rudy, but you still need to wash down there

Why are we doing this again? Once last month was more than enough.

I stopped after 2 minutes. What is with the urge to share? He should familiarize himself with the story of Ramon Navarro. Privacy is such a valuable commodity…and can keep you alive.

What I find unbelievable is that anyone would hire him to design their home interiors. He's doing nothing original here. Layering tartans, tweeds or brash patterns does not require training or a specialist. ANYONE can do that. We've seen it all before, it's as easy as going down the minimalist route.

AND it's hideous, well, the way he does it is

[quote] What I find unbelievable is that anyone would hire him to design their home interiors. He's doing nothing original here.

it doesn't work for the space, you can't open the furniture's doors and drawers, the TV and the clutter hide the paintings, the sofa is too big, I'd be scared to bump into the million tables and breaks things, and it's cheap cheap cheap

And you evil pricks have the nerve to make fun of ME??

A lot of stuff he uses in other interiors appear in his NY apartment. Wonder does he charge the rich sucker clients extra and keeps some bits back for himself. The curtains are instantly recognisable.

Interior designers are notorious for using leftover samples and from their own work and buying from showroom sample sales. Few are comfortably in the same financial position as their clients yet their are intensely aware of the.price of everything. wholesale and retail. They want the look of money without spending lots of it. Architects are the same which explains why so few live in houses of their own design; they can't afford first best and can't settle for second best, or third best. To justify themselves, lots of interior designers go for the design laboratory look and change everything constantly as they unload something and acquire something else. They simply say that their house is always in flux which is an excuse for why it never looks finished and always overfilled.

Yikes, Scot got old! R41, as a designer---ouch? But you do have a point. I definitely don't have the same budget as my clients, so I have learned the gift of mixing high and low together. If you can afford to invest in a few quality pieces, you can mix in things from places like Target. (The line of Studio McGee accessories for example hits it out of the park, though I personally despise Shea McGee.) People have remarked that my home has not really changed over the years. Things have of course but to my way of thinking it's mostly been refined. My own color preferences and design sensibility haven't shifted all that much since my art school days 25 years ago.

R42, what are your tastes/design inspirations? I'm fascinated by why the whole preppy thing is so big in the US.

Hi R43, so funny you ask that and the preppy thing. As I grew up and am now back living in Connecticut, preppy has always been part of how I grew up. But not all the needlepoint and tchotchkes. My style leans fairly traditional, but I like a healthy dose of modern into the mix. When I talk to clients, I like to use a 75% to 25% mix of either old or new. I have an old cottage, and it's harder to work on more modern pieces here. What's worked for me are some larger-scale antiques in a smaller space, with more modern artwork and lighting. I tend to like a limited but semi-bold color sense---deep greens, terra cotta, creams, black, brown, and white. A few designers I consider genius--Darryl Carter and Gil Shafer, though I have been thoroughly influenced by a lot of English designers like Ben Pentreath are doing modern traditional interiors that are very exciting. America doesn't seem entirely interested in that at the moment. These "transitional" designs that are popular now usually bore the piss out of me. The reason why Scot's apartment doesn't work for me and similarly Rudy's doesn't is that for my eye there is not nearly enough negative space. Both have some interesting stuff, but I think you need to understand how powerful editing can be.

Is his whole wardrobe tartan or plaid? Wonder does he present blown-out, eldergay hole in one of these?

Sound ideas and good examples of designers, R44. And definitely agree on quality and negative space.

I like things way more than most people, and always have and always will. For that I'm forgiving of other people with too much or with chaos of things sitting stop things sitting stop things -- if the things are genuinely good or interesting. But as much as I have, it's the spaces between things that make a room, that show off a good piece of furniture to advantage or some oddball thing of no great value can be important by its relationship to "better" things. Groupings of things that --just as is true for a painting or a sculpture-- have no real use except as visual interest are fine so long as you don't fill every surface indiscriminately, and if you understand color and scale and balance and the rest.

A room can hold a lot of things and be alive and interesting and confortable if the space between things is well played, ot it can look like a packed to the rafters storeroom where no one ever made a decision.

Less is more was never more apt than when looking at this guy's place. So much nice stuff drowned out by unnecessary clutter. Those owls are utterly dispensable, they have no artistic or design value. They're purely anecdotal but yet the collection appears across more than one room. Bedrooms are repurposed for clothing but then you see how that guy is dressed in basic shit and wonder what clothes of any value does he possess.

I'm convinced now I could be a designer.

[quote]Yes, he's married to a woman.

His partner is Drew Poling.

R2/R29 is just flat-out lying, they do this on a variety of threads. This is why you should use the ignore option, guys.

I absolutely loathe the entry hall and making it even more narrow with all those pictures has convinced me that Scot is, in fact, a serial killer. The collection of stuffed owls I believe proves my point.

That said, I really love the rest of the house. It was lovely to see a tartan couch that didn't look like it had been sitting in an estate home of reduced circumstances for 75 years prior to being rescued.

Stuffed owls can really 'perk' up an interior!

Oh shit, sorry, I posted a link at r49 that r31 already posted. How did I miss that?