LDF: Tuesday's highlights

By Suzanne Trocme

The LDF started with the slow fizz of champagne on Monday night but the bigger bang came on Tuesday with the intimate-yet-grand lunch party chez the French Ambassador, Maurice Gourdault-Montagne, in honour of Pierre Paulin - present with his delightful wife, Maia.

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The Ambassadorial residence certainly benefited from the addition of the ochre yellow re-edition Paulin pieces in the reception rooms. Sitting among Beauvais and Gobelins tapestries and brightly coloured Savonnerie carpets, they were a nod to the way France used to do things with their interiors - a la the Elysee Palace in the time of Mitterand, which both Andree Putman and Pierre Paulin 'decorated' with their pieces.

Grand dame of interior design Mary Fox Linton was present (designer of Axis restaurant at One Aldwych in London), as were a host of London design aficionados including our own Tony Chambers. I sat beside Paulin at lunch who said he preferred London to Paris since Paris is so 'mineral' and London is 'vegetal'.

He also pronounced in his demure speech (he does not waste words) that design is not art and art will never be design, that he is a technician who considers a material and its properties as a starting point. He said that artists are free and a designer has to respond to a client and that is the main difference between the two. He was gloriously concise in every manner in his somewhat limited English. He was also charming.

Someone more confident with his speaking ability was Alan Yentob who had all sorts of fascinating opinions. He really does use four syllables where one will do, but he is great company and I certainly like the mental agility a brain like his can offer to the arts.

Lunch was seated - with a plan de table, no less - service was white gloved, and food delicate, including the caviar de violette for dessert. Pascale Revert Wheeler, owner of Paris's Perimeter gallery, took responsibility for the re-editions which were to be shown later that day at sublime gallery Themes and Variations in Notting Hill. She and Bruno Allard from Ligne Roset hosted (Ligne Roset were launching the Pumpkin Sofa and chair and Tanis Desk by Paulin for the event).

Later the reception at Phillips and de Pury with Vitra Editions was a very elegant affair and a transportation from the maximalism of the morning to a chic white voluminous box.

I chatted and sashayed my way through the rooms with Jasper Morrison who, again demure in sentiment, said he had not visited the space before. We talked design, witnessing the fairs on offer from the usual suspects, Zaha Hadid, Tord Boontje, George Nakashima and so on to the more unusual Michael Wolfson pieces (a limed wood headboard with Toile de Jouy modern padded insert) and exquisite bowls by Rupert Spira, a ceramist on the ascendant.

Arik Levy's rocks were inviting my friend, Amanda Mann (of Blankettmann fame) to sit upon them, alas this was strictly not on. We then crept into the night to meet up with the other Wallpaper revellers atop Centre Point for the biggest bang of the day, where we danced the night away with the apologetic Fredrikson Stallard (whose Somerset House opening they had omitted to invite me to earlier that evening), Tom Dixon, Ron Arad, hansandfranz and Langlands & Bell. Bombay Sapphire cocktails were served, and served, until 2am.

17 September 2008 | Design