When Elsie de Wolfe was commissioned to design the interiors of New York's Colony Club in 1905 – the first-ever female members' club – it heralded the ascendance of "vulgar" chintz, elaborate garden trellising (inside!) and ornate Louis VX furniture (painted white, bien sur) in the collective consciousness of America's most chic. But more than that, it marked the advent of a métier.
Until de Wolfe burst onto the scene – dressed in Paris couture, a background as an actress and a "Boston marriage" with influential theatrical agent Bessie Marbury – a building's architect would usually devise its insides, too. But the Colony Club's architect Stanford White bowed before de Wolfe's decorative expertise (and, one suspects, her network, which included grande dames with names like Whitney, Frick and Astor) opening up the floodgates to an era of unbridled flamboyance.
