GLORIA VANDERBILT by Susanna Salk for 1stdibs
“She has the freshness of Snow White and the glamour of the Wicked Queen, she is as exotic as a unicorn and as subtle as an Egyptian temple cat,” wrote Gloria Vanderbilt’s late husband, author, Wyatt Cooper, about her in the 1969 catalogue documenting his beloved wife’s art show at the Hammer Gallery. Forty years later, his eloquent description of Vanderbilt holds more true than ever. Entering Vanderbilt’s jewel box of an apartment on Beekman Place one instantly sees that this Renaissance woman isn’t content to rest on the laurels of her many unique accomplishments and memories. Yes, there are certainly omnipresent testaments to her past prowess as an actress (both on stage and television), a writer (of a book of poetry, four memoirs and three novels), art shows (seven one woman shows in New York alone), fashion designer (elected into the Fashion Hall of Fame in 1971), and interior designer who decorated all eight of her legendary homes herself.
But visitors will understand as soon as they enter Vanderbilt's vivid pink and black vestibule, that its owner is not only devoted to the here and the now, but also to whatever surprises life may bring.

In her resplendent but cozy living room one of her beautiful landscape paintings hangs above her fireplace. It had belonged to Richard Avedon but Vanderbilt’s son, Anderson Cooper, recently bought it at an auction and gave it back to his mother as a surprise gift. Corkboard covers much of her guest room walls as Vanderbilt loves to cover them with a mixture of snapshots from her past and recent postcards from friends and invitations. “I am just as inspired from what has happened to me,” says Vanderbilt, “as what is about to happen.”
There is much to look forward to. For starters, there’s the debut of her novel, Obsession, (ITALICS) in June from Harper Collins; an upcoming retrospective of her work at the Southern Vermont Art Center; and two unique collaborations in the works, both celebrating her iconic eye and spirit.
“I was trying to thinking of a new twist for the 2009 Kips Bay Showhouse,” says celebrated interior designer Matthew Smyth who serves on its committee, “and I was at Roger Prigent’s apartment with Wendy Goodman who was talking about her project of a new book on Gloria Vanderbilt. I emailed Wendy that night asking if it was a crazy idea to ask Gloria to do a room. A few weeks later I was sitting in Gloria’s apartment brainstorming!”
The idea that was eventually hatched was based on a room Vanderbilt vividly remembers in New York’s Washington Mews where she lived as a teenager with her Aunt Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. It had provided her much beauty and warmth in her youth –(EMDASH)Vanderbilt even remembers "Coming home from a deb ball in the snow and looking up to the glowing window and finding it magical that the room would be there waiting for me.” Captured by the sentiment of her memory, Smyth found the most suitable space in the show house and  filled it with correlating pieces cinched on 1stdibs (ITALICS) such as a day bed and a painted mirror screen and then commissioned to be made in China, silver leaf squares to cover the ceiling and the walls. All along the way, his choices were presented to Vanderbilt to which she helped narrow down the selection as well as gave the room its title, “Memory and Desire,” because she explains, “Of the powerful memory of that room and my desire to recreate it again.”
 “I have had such joy collaborating with Gloria on a daily basis,” says Smyth. “This concept is really hers and I’m just producing it. She is the director and the writer!” There will also be a gallery-like area adjoining their main room which will house Vanderbilt’s distinct collection of collages, paintings, as well one of her singular Dream Boxes which are best described by Vanderbilt’s equally prolific and dear friend writer Joyce Carol Oates, "These are striking creations inside Plexiglas boxes that merit close, sympathetic scrutiny in the way that the most subtle of poems and dreams merit our scrupulous attention.”
As the doors set to open on Kips Bay 2009, (April 17th,) another more long-term collaboration is building momentum for a 2010 unveiling: a new book by design author, Wendy Goodman, entitled, The World of Gloria Vanderbilt, (ITALICS)published by Abrams, in which Vanderbilt will be celebrated via a photographic portrait.  The celebrated author, Goodman, who co-authored the 2007 smash best seller, Tony Duquette, (ITALICS) explains, “I was inspired by a black and white photograph Richard Avedon took of Gloria in her apartment. It was informal but elegant in a totally arresting way. It made me realize I had never seen a definitive portrayal in regards to her emergence and influence as a style icon, writer, artist, and decorator in her own extraordinary homes. This book will tell the story of an amazing life born of courage, talent, and the will to survive.”

As for the very subject around which so much admiration and activity centers, Vanderbilt is more one to build upon rather than bask in the swirl of adoring attention. Most days find her downstairs from her apartment in her art studio busily creating or outside trolling flea markets – (EMDASH) a pastime about which she cheerfully tells us,“I have never yet come back without anything so I have to be careful!”  As a testament to Vanderbilt’s infinite ability to weave the many strands of her creativity into one glorious web, is designer Chip Kidd’s compulsion to purchase two vintage doll’s heads in Vanderbilt’s studio and have a photograph of them as the cover image on her new book Obsession. (ITALICS)

Whatever the day brings, Vanderbilt still looks at the world as a place full of inspiration and challenge, not just as an artist but as a woman. As she once told Oates, “The strength of my work is female and that if that fits into a statement of historical significance, I would be pleased that it might have added to women's belief in themselves.”
Pouring through Vanderbilt’s 1979 book, Woman to Woman,(ITALICS) one is struck by the timelessness of so many of the mantras about which she is eager to share with her female readers. Leaving her apartment, past her art work and shelves of books, with the phone ringing  in the background, one lingers in the entryway, soaking in all that pink, but also to be reminded of one of her mantras in particular, “We are never too old to start and never old enough to stop.”

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