Books We Dig
Star Style: Interiors of Martyn Lawrence Bullard
Bel-Air Garden Club guest speaker Martyn Lawrence Bullard’s stunning book showcases Bullard’s trademark star style, from Hollywood glamour and unabashed pop art to Moroccan-inspired and sumptuously cool serenity. Star Style features Martin’s own properties in Los Angeles and Palm Springs. Star Style goes on to peek inside the homes of an array of glitterati from the worlds of music, fashion, stage, and screen, as well as some of Bullard’s most luxurious commissions for private homes and boutique hotels. Step inside Kylie Jenner’s kaleidoscopic Hidden Hills hideaway, Cher’s Malibu mansion, the modernist Mexican aerie Casa El Faro, and more.
Flowers
Former Bel-Air Garden Club guest speaker Charlotte Moss’ book encourages readers to bring the garden indoors with ideas for arrangements, vessels, and placement. Perhaps a cluster of inviting blooms on a guest room’s bedside table, lavish floral displays for parties and holidays, or single stems adding life to any corner of a room. All these are presented in a visual diary for inspiration.
Charlotte has been photographing her flower arrangements for over a decade. This book is a celebration of her artistry and a testament to flowers as part of day-to-day life. Additionally, Moss explores what defined past tastemakers like Gloria Vanderbilt and Lady Bird Johnson.
American Roots
American Roots’ unique approach highlights designers and creatives with 20 exceptional home gardens, focused on those who push the boundaries, trial extraordinary plants, embrace a regional ethos, and express their talents in highly personal ways. The book was co-authored by Bel-Air Garden Club 2023 guest speaker Nick McCullough along with his wife, Allison, and journalist, Teresa Woodard.
Julia Morgan: An Intimate Biography of the Trailblazing Architect
Victoria Kastner’s biography meticulously explores the life of renowned female architect Julia Morgan and outlines her vast work of 700 creations incorporating her motto of strength, functionality, and beauty. Victoria, a former speaker at the Bel-Air Garden Club in 2004, is a former Hearst Castle historian and curator. She fell in love with the castle’s rich history while touring the estate as a college student.
A Life in Design
This informative and illustrative book provides an overview of the interiors that Bel-Air Garden Club guest speaker Kathryn Ireland has designed over the past 30 years, including her own homes in Los Angeles, London, and the south of France. She shares her story of a life in design and lessons learned: from the early days in LA to designing houses all over the world from California to the Cotswolds.
Kathryn’s work is paired with a wealth of informal and invaluable advice on creating comfort, adding color, finding and hanging art, designing great spaces for entertaining, and the design guidelines she brings to every project.
Together at the Table: Entertaining at Home with the Creators of Juliska
February 2023 Bel-Air Garden Club speaker Capucine De Wulf Gooding’s new book co-written with her husband, David, titled Together at the Table, demonstrates more than just a table. The duo created their company, Juliska. After meeting the effervescent Capucine, one can understand the pages of living joyously and surrounding oneself with beauty. Capucine shares her outlook and wonderful images that support the couple’s philosophy and positive outlook on life.
No Place Like Home
Bel-Air Garden Club 2021 guest speaker Madeline Stuart provides an insight to her collection of interior designs and installations in recent years. Readers will gather an understanding of her erudite design process from initial vision to execution. The range of properties covered in the book offers a variety of interior styles from Cedric Gibbons and Delores Del Rio’s Santa Monica Streamline Moderne home to a Montana ranch to a Mediterranean coastal home. Madeline describes her style as timeless, understated, and lacking in pretense. The book also illustrates her commitment to artistry, craft, and respect for a home’s history.
Living Well By Design
Living Well by Design by October 2022 Bel-Air Garden Club guest speaker Melissa Penfold is an indispensable resource for anyone eager to create interiors in which decorating fundamentals are integrally interwoven with individual style. The book offers hundreds of invaluable tips on how to apply them to turn a house into a home that is comfortable, intimate, beautiful, and the most authentic expression of a personal aesthetic. Numerous photographs of homes from around the world will inspire and beguile readers and interior design enthusiasts.
Tomatomania!
Bel-Air Garden Club 2019 guest speaker Scott Daigre’s book Tomatomania! is a practical and fun guide. Scott offers a peek into his Ojai, California tomato patch and details a "reality gardening" approach to growing the world's favorite summer treat. Tomatomania! walks readers through every step of the tomato gardening process, from the earliest planning stages to those final satisfying kitchen table moments of the season.
Capability Brown: Designing the English Landscape
Bel-Air Garden Club past guest speaker John Phibbs’ book illustrates his 30+ years of research into 18th century landscape designer and icon Capability Brown. The book provides an in-depth and photographic look into Capability Brown’s most famous gardens and landscapes in Britain. Capability’s designs are organic, weaving gestures of color and perspective into the features that the country already afforded.
The Color of Roses
Bel-Air Garden Club’s speaker Danielle Dall’Armi Hahn’s must-have guide features her favorite 300 roses. Each rose image is photographed in the exact same way to provide an exact representation of the rose’s color and texture. The book is curated by Danielle along with her husband and family, who have grown more than 30,000 roses on their Rose Story Farm in Carpenteria. The Color of Roses featured roses were selected not only for their glorious and subtle color combinations but also for optimal availability, repeat blooming, disease resistance, improved vase life, and fragrance.