LENS versus LOOK

Shades of muted aquamarine, cinnabar, and sandstone serve to punctuate this gracious living room, with seating for six--or more--when the homeowners entertain family and friends. At the far end of the space the window wall is framed with lush curtains, tailored from Cowtan & Tout's 'BROMLEY' printed linen.

Shades of muted aquamarine, cinnabar, and sandstone serve to punctuate this gracious living room, with seating for six–or more–when the homeowners entertain family and friends. At the far end of the space the window wall is framed with lush curtains, tailored from Cowtan & Tout’s ‘BROMLEY’ printed linen. 

Senior Designer Craig Strulovitz
Photos by Gross & Daley

Many successful interior designers have a LOOK; they create instantly recognizable rooms, either through the employment of specific color schemes, blue and white spaces, for example, distinct styles, like traditional or modern, or signature elements that they favor, like particular light fixtures, finishes, or furniture silhouettes.

We take a different approach.

 Instead of having a LOOK, Glenn Gissler Design utilizes an aesthetic LENS through which we make choices, edit materials, and accessorize spaces. This LENS is informed by decades of crafting singular rooms–rooms specific to the homeowner we are working with. We take this approach because we believe the most successful interiors are those our clients have inspired us to create.

 Other factors, like the project’s location in the city, country, or beach, guide our decisions. The exterior architecture gives us clues, too; we consider the structural vocabulary of a home so that the exterior envelope and interior decorations are harmonious.

 Another guiding principle at GGD is that we NEVER SAY NEVER in the project’s planning stages. This way of thinking leads to distinctive and personal rooms. When everything is on the proverbial table, the creative process is only limited by the breadth of our (and our client’s) imagination. 

 Let me give you an example.

A vibrant canvas by the late American abstract impressionist painter John Opper (1908-1994) takes pride of place in the apartment’s gracious living room. Two deep-seated sofas are upholstered in lush blue velvet, with a pair of club chairs covered in a Zak & Fox textile and two Regency-style benches covered in paprika-hued velvet. The curtains were tailored from a Cowtan & Tout floral fabric.

A vibrant canvas by the late American abstract impressionist painter John Opper takes pride of place in the apartment’s gracious living room. Two deep-seated sofas are upholstered in lush blue velvet, with a pair of club chairs covered in a Zak & Fox textile and two Regency-style benches covered in paprika-hued velvet. The curtains were tailored from a Cowtan & Tout floral fabric.

In this recently completed apartment in the Carnegie Hill neighborhood of Manhattan, our clients asked us to create a home cohesively inflected with traditional references–including floral patterned textiles, which, while not a house code for our firm, became part of the scheme.

Having gathered floral fabric samples from various showrooms, we set off to present them to our clients. And as it turned out, they favored many from the heritage brand Cowtan & Tout. Something was alluring about the quality, texture, and sensibility of the firms’ selections. Below are some of their fabrics and how they were used in this apartment, including stripes and solids we sourced through Cowtan & Tout as well.

SEE THE ENTIRE PROJECT HERE

Anne Hanavan & Glenn Gissler

One last thought: In a world of impersonal and ever-more-automated interactions, we wanted to tip our hats to our sales representative from Cowtan & Tout, the delightful, energetic, fun, and responsive Anne Hanavan. She’s always available to help us source a textile–and her professionalism is first-rate! Here’s to you, Anne!

Throw pillows on the living room sofas were made from Cowtan & Tout’s JAGO in the colorway BURNT ORANGE.Throw pillows on the living room sofas were made from Cowtan & Tout’s JAGO in the colorway BURNT ORANGE.

Throw pillows on the living room sofas were made from Cowtan & Tout’s JAGO in the colorway BURNT ORANGE.

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The living room curtains were tailored in Cowtan & Tout’s BROMLEY, in the colorway SAND/RED.

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Dining Room has existing Cowtan & Tout upholstered walls in a discontinued Cabbage Rose.

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The Roman shade is tailored in Cowtan & Tout’s GISELLE STRIPE in the colorway PATINA in the home office. That pattern was also used as trim for the leading edge of the portiere curtain.

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Additionally, the window seat cushion and desk chair were covered in Cowtan & Tout’s ASTA in the colorway OCEAN. That fabric was also used for the headboard in the blue bedroom.

“We want to give clients a new home with carefully edited pieces that reflect their lives in a way that brings joy.”

– Glenn Gissler

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A sage-toned Bridgewater-armed club chair provides the perfect spot for afternoon reading or a cup of tea before bed. When paired with the curtains–tailored from Colefax and Fowler’s GREENACRE print–the tableau mirrors verdant Central Park just outside the window.

West End Apartment for Sale

Designed by Glenn Gissler Design, this exquisite, mint 10 room home, located in a premier Upper West Side prewar coop, will take your breath away. A private elevator landing welcomes you into a stunning apartment of enormous proportions. The grand entry foyer opens into a luxurious living room with a wood burning fireplace, a beautiful dining room and warm and inviting library.

StreetEasy: West End Apartment for Sale

See the full listing details on StreetEasy.com

Learn more about the design process and art selection.

Quality, Visual Interest, and Editing

In the apartment’s entryway, an arresting painted-wood Lanna Thai Buddhist manuscript holder, which once held contemplative texts, now provides a surface to display an ever-changing montage of books, flowers, and object d’art. The ink-on-newspaper drawing above is by the Vietnamese artist Dinh Y Nhi.

In the entryway to a collector’s apartment we designed, an arresting painted-wood Lanna Thai Buddhist manuscript holder, which once held contemplative texts, was part of the homeowner’s collection. It now provides a surface to display an ever-changing montage of books, flowers, and object d’art. The ink-on-newspaper drawing above is by the Vietnamese artist Dinh Y Nhi.

Photos by Gross & Daley

When potential clients approach us, they have ideas about how they want to live in their new (or newly renovated) home. In a series of phone calls and meetings, we work to understand that vision, paying close attention to detail. 

Next, we work to discover deeper information such as specific color preferences, how they imagine entertaining guests–and how often, and their relationship with the art they already own.

This interview process is vital for understanding a client’s needs and aspirations long before we consider any structural changes to their space, furniture plans, textiles, or lighting. 

Occasionally we are approached by clients who have collected furnishings, object d’art, and decorative artifacts from traveling, as was the case with our Bachelor’s Apartment. The homeowner has spent decades traversing the globe–zealously discovering and collecting from newly explored cultures. He asked that we incorporate some of his collection into our new design.

“We want to give clients a new home with carefully edited pieces that reflect their lives in a way that brings joy.”

– Glenn Gissler

For some decorators, this creates a challenge because they strive to control the entire creative process; wherever possible, we take a more relaxed approach.

But we have been hired to give them a “new” home, not just a rearrangement of their existing furnishings, which means change. So we study existing pieces, focusing on their quality and visual interest to see where they can enhance a new scheme. We want to give clients a new home with carefully edited pieces that reflect their lives in a way that brings joy.

A Chinese scroll painted by Shanghai-born, Singapore-based artist Hong Zhu takes pride of place above an expansive four-seat sofa in the style of Jean Michel Frank, which is upholstered in lush velvet.  Framed and hung in landscape format, the work creates a horizon, establishing a dialogue with the striped club chair seen to the left. The small Isamu Noguchi lamp enhances the linear motif. The Choros Chandelier, designed by Barry Goralnick, strikes a serpentine counterpoint.

A Chinese scroll painted by Shanghai-born, Singapore-based artist Hong Zhu takes pride of place above an expansive four-seat sofa in the style of Jean Michel Frank, which is upholstered in lush velvet.  Framed and hung in landscape format, the work creates a horizon, establishing a dialogue with the striped club chair seen to the left. The small Isamu Noguchi lamp enhances the linear motif. The Choros Chandelier, designed by Barry Goralnick, strikes a serpentine counterpoint.

Another critical consideration is the sentimentality connected to belongings. We try to be particularly sensitive to deeply personal pieces–like an object handed down through generations. 

In Carl Dellatore’s book, Interior Design Master Class, I wrote about my views on design alchemy, “Alchemists have existed in every major civilization—along with great artists and artisans— all engaged in an attempt to transform base metals into gold. Similarly, a good designer possesses a knowledge of elements that, when amalgamated, create magic in an interior.”

So when a client brings objects to the table, we study them to see where we can create an alchemical spark by mixing them with newly acquired pieces–establishing a moment of excitement larger than the sum of a room’s parts.

A pair of Korean blanket chests, one taller than the other, serve as bedside tables in the master bedroom. The walls are sheathed in muted sapphire and are complemented by the terracotta-toned pic-stitched bed cover. A seagrass area rug and a canvas by Southeast Asian artist Eric Chan anchor the room.

A pair of Korean blanket chests, one taller than the other, serve as bedside tables in the primary bedroom. The walls are sheathed in muted sapphire and are complemented by the terracotta-toned pic-stitched bed cover. A seagrass area rug and a canvas by Southeast Asian artist Eric Chan anchor the room.

 

One final advantage to incorporating vintage and antique furnishings in a new design is that they lend a historical narrative. That has immense value because successful rooms appear collected over a lifetime of experience and adventure versus spaces that feel “placed” there on the installation day. 

The intricately painted surface of a table purchased on vacation to Thailand, several toss pillows fashioned from a centuries-old Persian Suzani, or a pair of Chinese urns repurposed as lamps: these historical notes that you won’t find in a space principally populated with newly manufactured pieces.



10 Artists You Should Know

Over my nearly four decades working in interior design, I’ve had the pleasure of assisting clients in choosing artists and artworks that will enrich the rooms I create–and to enhance their experience of living in them.  But for those just setting out to form an art collection, this can be an intimidating task. The omnipresent question remains: Where do we begin?

At the beginning of my career, it was a bit more involved. But in the twenty-first-century information age, all that’s required is curiosity and an internet connection.  Here are 10 suggestions for artists you should know, and examples of their work.

 

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A long carved-wood trestle bench beckons to guests in this tableau replete with Chinese Chippendale tables. A work by April Gornick hangs above.

 

April Gornik 

April Gornik is an American painter whose atmospheric landscape paintings focus heavily on cloud formations. “Now I make my landscapes so that I can be in them,” the artist remarked. “That’s why I alter them [landscapes], that’s why I make them somewhat artificial because I want to take possession of them.” Born on April 20, 1953, in Cleveland, OH, she studied at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax, Canada, receiving her BFA there in 1976.

Strongly referencing American Luminists like John Fredrick Kensett, the artist’s work has gained significant attention and critical acclaim since her first solo exhibition. Gornik lives and works in Long Island, NY with her husband, the painter Eric Fischl. Her works are presently held in the collections of institutions such as The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C, among others.”

To investigate further, April Gornik is represented by the Miles McEnery Gallery in New York.

 

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The 1959 painting by Abstract Expressionist painter Judith Godwin, entitled ‘Black Cross’, pairs beautifully with the striking Jules Leleu modernist table-desk and the pair of vintage Jacques Adnet leather-wrapped chairs. The rusted steel sculpture by Marino di Teana sits proudly on a mahogany pedestal in the window.

 

Judith Godwin (1930-2021)

Like many other women artists of her generation, Judith Godwin received less attention in the mid-and late twentieth century from the press and public than her male counterparts. Godwin explained the bias behind this imbalance, recalling that at the time, “the men simply said, ‘Women can’t paint.’” However, the steadfast creativity and accomplishment of Godwin and other women of her time have become increasingly acknowledged and given overdue consideration. Among the recent efforts at such restitution was the 2016 groundbreaking exhibition, Women of Abstract Expressionism, held at the Denver Art Museum.”

I met the remarkable artist Judith Godwin (1930-2021) on her 89th birthday at the opening of ‘An Act of Freedom’ at Berry Campbell. When we designed the Grand Parlor in the Brooklyn Heights Showhouse we featured “Black Cross”, 1959 a brawny and outstanding early work by the spirited painter.

Godwin’s work is represented in many museum collections including MoMA, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and The Art Institute of Chicago. To investigate further, Judith Godwin’s work is represented by Berry Campbell in New York.

 

Gissler West End Avenue Apartment Livingroom 2

The 1947 painting, “Fugue,” by Abstract Expressionist James Brooks, rivets our attention. Poised on the custom coffee table is an ancient work of Pre-Columbian art, a Colima Carinate Vessel, between 300 B.C. and 300 A.D., from Douglas Dawson Gallery.

 

James Brooks (1906-1992)

James Brooks was an Abstract Expressionist who was deeply ‘in the mix’ with the Greenwich Village arts community, including Jackson Pollack and Lee Krasner. When Pollack and Krasner moved to Long Island, Brooks moved into their apartment. He married artist Charlotte Park in 1947, the same year he painted the painting in the image above. And then, in 1949, he and Park moved to East Hampton to live and work near their artist friends on the East End of Long Island.

James Brooks‘ artwork is in many significant art museums including the Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum, Art Institute of Chicago, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fogg Art Museum Harvard University, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and many, many more.

To investigate further, James Brooks’ work is represented by Van Doren Waxter in New York.

 

Gissler - Pied-à-Terre – Greenwich Village, NYC - Study Wide

This dining room also acts as a study that can be used for occasional entertaining, centered upon the Empire round table the clients brought from Colorado. The chairs are from a 1930s ocean liner. A portiere marks the separation from the bedroom. The large-scale photograph is by Edward Burtynsky.

 

Edward Burtynsky

Much of the photographic oeuvre of Edward Burtynsky participates in dialogue and criticism about how we treat our planet, and the humans that share it. He has turned his lens on the terrible beauty of industrial interventions in nature such as mining, quarrying, manufacturing, shipping, the production of oil, and recycling.

Here, his focus is on the Three Gorges Dam project in China where approximately 1.13 million people were ‘relocated’ and their livelihoods were challenged when fertile agricultural lands and important cultural/historic sites were submerged under a vast reservoir.

Burtynsky’s work is both beautiful in its composition and execution, while simultaneously frightening as he exposes some of the large-scale violence against nature in contemporary society. To investigate further, Edward Burtynsky is represented by Howard Greenberg Gallery in New York.

 

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In lieu of the ubiquitous television, a metal sculpture by Richard Filopowski sits on the limestone fireplace mantle in this grand West Village home.

 

Richard Filipowski (1923-2008)

Richard Filipowski was originally a student, then a faculty member of the New Bauhaus where he taught alongside Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer from 1946-to 1950. He would subsequently go on to hold positions at the Institute of Design in Chicago, Harvard School of Design, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he taught for 36 years.

Filipowski’s works are in numerous museum collections including The Philadelphia Museum, The Museum of Fine Art in Boston, the Addison Gallery of American Art, and the Walter Gropius House Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts.

While Filipowski was a prolific artist, creating hundreds of drawings, paintings, sculptures, he was deeply private about his personal creative endeavors. Referring to them as “art of the psyche”, he believed that they were purely a process of self-expression and exploration, a personal endeavor not need not be subject to criticism of commercialization. This impulse towards privacy, coupled with his lifelong dedication to educating others, are contributing factors to his having achieved less notoriety than some of his Bauhaus peers.

To investigate further, Richard Filipowski’s work is represented by Hostler Burrows in New York.

 

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A 1955 painting by Joan Mitchell in a gilded frame hangs above the mantelpiece in a high-rise duplex apartment realized by Glenn Gissler Design.

 

Joan Mitchell (1925 –1992)

Joan Mitchell was an American artist whose primary medium was oil paint on canvas, although she also created drawings and prints. “Over the course of nearly five decades, she established a singular visual vocabulary rooted in gestural abstraction.”

Although she lived in France for much of her life she is considered a member of the ‘New York School’ of artists in the 1950s, often referred to as the abstract expressionist movement.

While most of the women artists of the time were marginalized, Mitchell was one of her era’s few female painters to gain critical and public acclaim. Her paintings, drawings, and editioned prints can be seen in major museums and collections around the world, and are now highly coveted and command enormous prices. Here’s an excellent overview of Mitchell and her work.

To investigate further, Joan Mitchell’s work is represented by David Zwirner in New York.

 

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A large, lively, and colorful canvas by Larry Poons hangs above the sofa, flanked by Ombre Italian Lamps from the 1950s in acidic yellow and greens that add an element of surprise to the room’s palette.

 

Larry Poons

An American abstract painter, Larry Poons originally intended on becoming a musician and composer, studied music and musical composition at the New England Conservatory of Music from 1955 to 1957. However, after seeing a Barnett Newman exhibition in 1959, he gave up his work in musical composition and enrolled at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and studied at the Art Students League of New York.

Associated with Op Art, Hard-edge painting, Color Field painting, Lyrical Abstraction, and Abstract Expressionism, Poons has challenged critical expectations throughout his career, transitioning through several distinct phases of work. According to New York Times critic Roberta Smith, “Since emerging in the 1960s, Mr. Poons has shown a strong preference for allover fields of pulsing color, even if his means of achieving them have varied enormously.”

To investigate further, Larry Poons is represented by Yares Art in New York.

 

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A crisp classic of early 20th-century design, De Stijl designer Gerrit Rietveld’s Zig-zag chair is paired with a framed 1958 drawing that dominates the vignette by American artist Sonia Gechtoff.

 

Sonia Gechtoff (1926-2018)

Before moving to New York City in the late 1950s, Sonia Gechtoff spent her formative years immersed with the San Francisco Beat Generation deeply influencing her development as an artist. She gained national recognition in 1954 when her work was exhibited in the Guggenheim Museum’s “Younger American Painters” show alongside Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Robert Motherwell, and Jackson Pollock.

I offered this incredible late 1950s drawing to a couple of clients who declined; I wouldn’t let this one get away, so I bought it for myself and she has been with me for a dozen years. The drawing and I are more or less the same age and it serves as an inspiration to remain in motion!

To investigate further, Sonia Gechtoff’s work is represented by David Richard Gallery in New York.

 

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2013; Dr. Christopher Dresser, Vase, c. 1875, Minton Pottery Factory, English manufacturer, 1793-present. Porcelain with enamels and gilding. 20.3 x 12.7 x 12.7 cm (8 x 5 x 5 inches).

 

Christopher Dresser (1834-1904)

Nineteenth-century British industrial designer Christopher Dresser was (and remains) a hugely influential character in my work. A pivotal figure in the Aesthetic Movement and a major contributor to the allied Anglo-Japanese or Modern Style (referred to as British Art Nouveau), Dresser was a prolific multi-disciplinarian, having produced carpets, ceramics, furniture, glass, graphics, metalwork, including silver and electroplate, and textiles printed and woven.

I delight in placing pieces by Dresser in my interior design projects, but as an alum of The Rhode Island School of Design, I revel in donating his works to that institution’s formidable museum. My dear friend the art historian Lisa Zeiger wrote about my history of bequeathing objects to the museum in this enlightening post. Since 1984 I’ve

As an aside: There are always wonderful pieces by Dresser up for auction online–most notably on eBay and 1st Dibs. And frankly considering Dresser’s relative importance in the canon of Western industrial design, there are always bargains to be found which makes adding his work to your collection affordable.

 

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Art pervades the kitchen in this Gissler-designed lower 5th Avenue apartment, with a large drawing by Donald Baechler. Just beyond are mid-century Austrian chairs with pierced slats designed in the 1950s for Vienna’s city hall.

 

Donald Baechler 

“An American artist who figured prominently in the Neo-Expressionist and Pop Art movements during the 1980s, Donald Baechler Incorporates child-like depictions of iconic subjects, such as flowers, birds, and ice cream cones. The works convey a feeling of memory without becoming an illustration. Culled from a huge archive of images the artist has collected, his prints, paintings, and sculptures focus more on formal attributes than narrative. “I’m drawn to silhouettes because of their emblematic rather than their illustrational quality,” he reflected. “I see them as shapes, allowing an image to become an abstraction and for pure painting to take place.”

Born on November 22, 1956, in Hartford, CT, he grew up in a Quaker family who nourished his early artistic talent. He went on to study at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore from 1974 to 1977 and continued his education at New York’s Cooper Union. In New York, he befriended Tony Shafrazi, who in 1979 founded a downtown gallery that reflected his interest in artwork inspired by graffiti art. In this milieu, Baechler found himself amidst figures such as Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Kenny Scharf. He continues to live and works in New York, NY. Today, his works are held in the collections of the Goetz Collection in Munich, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, among others.”

To investigate further, Donald Baechler is represented by Cheim Read in New York.

 

 

5 Rules for Placing Art and Objects in an Interior

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In this sitting room, a series of large Walton Ford editions are installed in a grid on the rich green-brown walls. The pair of vintage 1970’s table lamps are the perfect complement to the tailored upholstery in a warm mix of deep browns, greens, and oranges.

 

In interior design, every surface is important, but the alchemy of design comes into play when designers introduce and orchestrate fine art and objects, humble or precious, simple or ornate.

Speaking personally, art in the interior is the great transformer, the secret formula for achieving superlative design. It’s a subject I examined in detail in Carl Dellatore’s best-seller Interior Design Master Class. In the excerpts below, I share what I consider to be the 5 rules to consider when placing art in an interior. (more…)

Votive Offerings: Glenn Gissler at RISD Museum

Gissler - Book and Room RISD MuseumGissler - Book and Room RISD Museum

This month, my friend the decorative arts historian Lisa Zeiger wrote an interesting article entitled VOTIVE OFFERINGS: GLENN GISSLER AT RISD about my relationship with my alma mater, the Rhode Island School of Design, and more specifically with the RISD Museum, on her blog BOOK AND ROOM.

As a RISD alum, former board member, and devoted museum donor, it’s been my goal to help give students and visitors the opportunity to experience and draw inspiration from the museum’s collection. Lisa’s post chronicles my decades-long quest to donate notable fine art, industrial design and decorative objects to the RISD Museum, with a personal goal of bequeathing 1000 objects in total. You can read the post by following this link

I lived with many of these items in my NYC apartment before they found a new home at the RISD Museum, including a partners desk with two chairs by Donald Judd, and works on paper by Kiki SmithSol LewittLeon Golub, and Vija Celmins. I also have passed along objects by the 19th century industrial designer Christopher Dresser, and 20th century objects by Josef HoffmannEttore Sottsass, Joe Columbo and Russel Wright.

You’ll find just a selection of my notable donations to the museum below, and if you’re so inclined, you can follow this link to the museum’s website, which shows many more with descriptions and details.