Kate Schelter, Author of CLASSIC STYLE: HAND IT DOWN, DRESS IT UP, WEAR IT OUT
[0:10]Welcome to mom's don't have time to read books, the podcast that features conversations with
[0:15]writers of all types. Today's episode of mom's don't have time to read books has been sponsored
[0:20]by the craft studio with locations in New York City on the upper east side of in Tribeca,
[0:24]the craft studio is a perfect place to bring your kids for some crafting fun.
[0:27]Craft Studio NYC dot com. I'm here today with Kate Schilder, who is the author of classic style,
[0:34]hand it down, dress it up, wear it out, who does everything. She's an artist, branding expert,
[0:40]design guru and stylist. Her work has been featured in Vogue, The New York Times,
[0:45]Domino W, and many other publications. A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design,
[0:50]Kate now lives with her husband and daughter in New York City and Kate God. Right? Yeah. Okay.
[0:55]Okay. Nice to meet you. So you do like a hundred different things, right? Stiling for runway,
[1:03]editorial advertising, collateral packaging, murals and hotels and restaurants. You make
[1:10]stationery and place guards, fashion branding illustrations, pajamas. And you wrote this book,
[1:17]which I bought as soon as I saw it in KRB designs on 74th and Lex, amazing store for anyone listening.
[1:23]You want to shout out to KRB. I met Kate when we met when you had a book party there and you had
[1:32]all of your illustrations of. So what don't you do? Like, how do you organize your time? Do you
[1:38]still all do all of this? How do you schedule it? Like, that's the first thing I need to know.
[1:43]Well, I do one thing at a time. So you've just compiled my whole 20 year career and I do one paragraph.
[1:54]So I have done each and every one of those things. But right now I focus on
[2:02]well, being an author, but I published my book, Classic Style. And so mostly I spend my time
[2:09]going between being an artist and an illustrator and working watercolor. And I also do creative
[2:16]direction and branding for companies, which is something I've been doing since I graduated from
[2:21]college. Excellent. So it's really the one thing at all of those different things. The styling,
[2:28]the advertising, the art direction, all of that and the murals and everything else.
[2:36]Forget all the things I've done. But they all have in common is that I'm using my eye
[2:42]and my vision and my editing skills. So it's all about creating a composition. It's all about
[2:50]editing with my gut about what I love. And it's as much about what you don't use as what you do
[2:57]use. What's in the frame is important as a visual, no matter if it's an outfit, a piece of art,
[3:07]the tang on the wall, a mural, it's all about what you put in and what you leave out.
[3:13]So interesting. And you can just tell, you can look at an outfit and see this needs this,
[3:19]this needs that. It's just a gift. It's composition. I don't have a musical
[3:28]composition ear, but I have a visual composition eye. So neat. I want to get one of that.
[3:36]So it's like playing different instruments or you people call wearing different hats.
[3:43]I just can see it. For my own aesthetic, different people have different aesthetics. But for me,
[3:51]it's very clear what things are in harmony and what things create a healthy tension that makes things
[3:58]interesting. Things that can be subtle. So it's sort of like using notes and pacing in music,
[4:05]but I can do it with colors and shapes, so many textures. And I feel like your classic style and
[4:13]all of your artwork and your watercolors, they have this sort of simplicity. That's like the wrong
[4:19]word because that sounds bad in a way. But because they're so interesting and yet and almost
[4:26]photographic in a way. I really love photography and I don't usually like the medium of painting
[4:35]as much, but there's something about the way you do it that it's like you get this emotional
[4:41]reaction to it, the way you went from a photo, does that make sense? What do you think that's
[4:46]all about? Like why do people react emotionally? Well, I think for two reasons. One is that
[4:54]I only, if you're talking about my paintings, I only paint things that I absolutely love in real
[4:59]life. Okay. So in that way, again, I'm editing with my gut by choosing the subject matter to paint.
[5:07]So I think if I'm reacting to it, hopefully someone else will be reacting to it. You know,
[5:13]in writing, they use the metaphor. If you're crying when you're writing it, the reader will be
[5:19]crying when they read it. If you really go to the heart and the truth of what you're doing.
[5:24]And I think the other reason for that is that I work in watercolor and I work on a very specific
[5:30]type of paint and type of paper and brush that I use. My palette is, you know, the equivalent to
[5:37]photographers type of camera or film or paper that they would print it on. And it's very
[5:45]simple and very immediate. So it's not simple boring. It's simple truthful.
[5:53]So how did the book come to be? Did you decide? Well, how did the book come to be?
[5:58]I was just painting like crazy after I had my daughter and I was sort of switching over from being
[6:04]a full-time stylist art director to a full-time artist, illustrator and creative director.
[6:13]And it just happened. I mean, I really didn't have a plan. But it's one of those things in
[6:22]hindsight. It makes so much sense. And it's like, oh, that was the path that you were on. I was like,
[6:26]yeah, but I didn't know it at the time. And I was just painting while my daughter would nap.
[6:32]I painted actually for about a year and a half while I was pregnant. And before I was pregnant,
[6:39]I illustrated a book called Gypset by my friend Julia Chaplin. And that was the first time I had
[6:45]my illustrations published. And then sort of like friends who were also in the industry,
[6:50]such as people started just noticing it. And I was just playing around with Instagram and figuring
[6:55]out how that even worked. I thought it was a camera filter. I didn't understand that.
[7:00]It was like social media or like why you would be on that. I'm not very social media as
[7:06]savvy. Sort of late to the game, although now I really have fun with it. And so what's your
[7:14]Instagram handle? Like what's your? At Kate Shelter. K-A-T-E-S-C-H-E-L-T-E-R. And my agent approached me and said,
[7:27]you have a book in you. I don't know what it is. Or it has something to do with fashion. It's
[7:32]something to do with your career. It has definitely something to do with it's going to be visual
[7:38]with your paintings. And we just met with a bunch of different publishers and ended up going with
[7:44]Grand Central, which is a division of Hashette. And they, it all just bloomed out of our meeting
[7:53]and our conversation. And honestly when I started writing the book, I didn't have an outline.
[7:58]I didn't have anything in mind. I just wrote, wrote, wrote, wrote, wrote. And then I would paint,
[8:03]paint, paint. Sometimes, sometimes in the same day I would write and paint. Sometimes I would do
[8:09]a week of painting. I didn't even know what I was painting. And then it wasn't till we were designing
[8:14]the book and my editor went through. And I fully credit my editor Brittany with
[8:21]um architecting the book. She gave all of my sort of improvisations that I was very clear about,
[8:34]but didn't actually know the format too. She gave it a structure. She gave it the blueprint.
[8:39]And she'd say, you know, that paragraph that you want to be the conclusion or the last page of
[8:43]your book should be the introduction to your book. Something like that, for example. And then we
[8:49]I was really heavily involved in the design of the book, although I didn't actually design it.
[8:55]And they let me sort of get in there and pair all the artwork with different passages. And then
[9:00]sometimes the designer would have an idea that would be really like eye-opening to me. And I would go with
[9:06]that. So it was just a completely improvised process that just came from my heart. To be honest,
[9:16]and sometimes I would write passages. And my editor would say, okay, you wrote three sentences,
[9:21]but I think you have about four pages. So just keep going with that. You know, I learned
[9:29]words such as writing prompt. I was like, I didn't know that that was even a thing.
[9:33]You know. So it was really, it was a two-year process from when we sold the book to when it was
[9:40]published. And I wrote and illustrated the book in about four months. Wow. And then, I mean, it just
[9:47]came pouring out of me. I was like, I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'm just going to keep
[9:51]doing it. And my editor organized me. And I just, I can't tell you how exciting it was to get
[10:00]And she would have read through my drafts
[10:02]and then come back to me with comments.
[10:04]I was like, oh my god, it was the most exciting email
[10:07]so that's how it came out about.
[10:11]And you had tried blogging,
[10:12]but you said you didn't liken it all.
[10:14]Yeah, that's not a real, I didn't really blog.
[10:17]I mean, I wrote maybe five or 10 articles
[10:21]for the Huffington Post.
[10:23]It was sort of right, let's see, what one was that?
[10:26]It was like in the mid 2000s,
[10:28]when everybody was like blog.
[10:30]And I think they sort of tapped me
[10:34]to have just sort of bring my sensibility
[10:39]but it wasn't really a four.
[10:40]I don't know how it happened.
[10:42]I was interviewed by a style writer for the Huffington Post
[10:45]and then they were like, you should blog also.
[10:47]I was like, great.
[10:49]But again, it was a little bit too much improvisation
[10:53]and I didn't have someone to sort of structure me in.
[10:56]So I would sort of be like, is this worth a blog post?
[10:59]I just wasn't into it.
[11:00]I was like, I'd much rather just style people
[11:03]and then write about me styling about people.
[11:08]Right.
[11:11]Your book told a lot about the history
[11:14]of like how you got into illustration and everything.
[11:17]What I loved the most was all the stuff
[11:20]about your family, I don't know if that make me creepier
[11:22]or something, but that's been the number one comment
[11:26]from every single reader people who know me really well
[11:29]and people who don't know me.
[11:30]They all, and that was a shock that was even in the book.
[11:34]Again, that was sort of like I would kind of riff on,
[11:37]oh my mom used to do this or my sisters would do this
[11:40]or my brother would do this.
[11:42]My dad said this to me once and they were kind of just
[11:46]peppered into the manuscript
[11:49]and my editor really encouraged me to go down those roads.
[11:57]And I have a visual memory,
[12:00]I can almost remember everything I've ever seen in a weird way.
[12:03]Sometimes I need a little reminding,
[12:06]but I just like would go down to like what type of fabric
[12:12]my sheets were made out of when I was 13 years old
[12:15]and how that, I still have that fabric in my house now.
[12:18]And just there was a huge, I think a huge part
[12:22]of my creative process started when I was a teenager
[12:27]and all I would do was sit in my room and make art
[12:29]when I wasn't playing with friends or at school.
[12:34]And you told, you sort of put forth this theory
[12:38]that as a fourth child, when your family,
[12:41]when your parents got a divorce, you're an eighth grade
[12:43]and your siblings that I'll basically left the nest
[12:47]at that point and your left to sort through everything
[12:49]and that art and painting became one of the ways
[12:52]that you dealt with that, is that right or not exactly right?
[12:57]Kind of right.
[12:57]Well, first of all, my parents didn't get divorced
[12:59]when I was an eighth grade, they separated, sorry, sorry.
[13:02]It's okay, it's fine, I'm just clarifying for myself.
[13:05]So there was ambiguity, they didn't get divorced
[13:08]until after I got out of college actually.
[13:10]Oh wow.
[13:11]And there was just a lot of pain and ambiguity
[13:15]and it was very lonely.
[13:20]And at the same time I had these really loving siblings
[13:26]who were constantly checking in on me.
[13:29]And my parents were doing the best they could,
[13:33]but I had always done art.
[13:38]I had always loved to make things with my hands
[13:40]since there's pictures of me always dressing up
[13:44]and always making things.
[13:46]But it became kind of my,
[13:50]I don't even realize until looking back at it.
[13:52]It was sort of like the glue that held it all together.
[13:55]It's what I would do.
[13:56]You know, there wasn't iPhones,
[13:58]I was really not even allowed to watch television growing up.
[14:01]And so there was a lot of quiet in the house
[14:06]and I just filled it with making collages for friends,
[14:11]cutting up old magazines, always making things,
[14:17]patching my jeans in all my mom's fabric remnants
[14:22]or everything I'm like.
[14:24]Like, Pierre dupe hatches all over my jeans,
[14:26]Laura Ashley, Schumacher Fabrics, all the things.
[14:30]And I would patch my Levi's and use my mom's sewing machine,
[14:36]do things, I was always making things with my hands.
[14:39]I feel like we grew up in the same time.
[14:41]Like all of those things that you are painting
[14:43]or you put in the book are things like,
[14:46]I'm like, oh my gosh, like those tree turns I had.
[14:48]Yeah.
[14:49]You know, the, what you say when I'm here the fabric.
[14:51]I know, I like, I don't know why I feel lately.
[14:53]There's been this big 80s nostalgia that's even like more,
[14:57]like it's everywhere and it's,
[14:59]I'm thinking about it a lot more.
[15:00]And I don't know, I just feel like it's like,
[15:03]it's coming into bogue now.
[15:05]I love this.
[15:05]I just always go with things that I love.
[15:07]And my mom was an interior designer
[15:11]and has a really classic sense of style
[15:14]and also she actually lives in Europe.
[15:17]And now she does.
[15:20]And, you know, all the things that she always loved,
[15:24]I definitely love.
[15:25]But I do it in a slightly different way.
[15:27]Yeah, it's so cool.
[15:28]Yeah.
[15:30]In the book, you have a lot of these two page experts,
[15:32]sprinkled in interviews with your friends,
[15:34]it's kind of like an end of vanity fair, you know,
[15:37]like it was heavily inspired by that age.
[15:40]Yes, it was.
[15:41]But you didn't do one for you.
[15:43]So I wanted to ask you a few of the books.
[15:45]I feel like the whole book was,
[15:46]I know, but there's some time,
[15:47]I know, but like just the cliff notes.
[15:49]Yeah, so can I ask you just a few
[15:51]and then you just give me like a cliff notes answer?
[15:53]We'll try it.
[15:54]Sure.
[15:54]You know what I mean?
[15:55]Yeah.
[15:56]Okay, preferred mode of transportation.
[15:58]My vintage swan bike.
[16:01]Always in your fridge.
[16:07]Mustard.
[16:09]Okay, a quick description of your overall look.
[16:16]Carefree, simple, 70s inspired.
[16:21]Nice.
[16:22]Kate, by the way, is wearing white Jean overalls
[16:25]and a white t-shirt sitting here
[16:26]and looks just super cool with her,
[16:27]like, brown leather clogs and her.
[16:29]Thank you.
[16:30]That's the first day I've been able to wear them all.
[16:33]Oh, it's like this gross day outside
[16:36]and you're looking so chic and elegant.
[16:38]Thank you.
[16:39]Go to drink, water, sparkling water,
[16:43]sparkling water.
[16:45]Skill, you dream of mastering.
[16:52]That's a tough one.
[16:54]I love all the things that I already love.
[16:56]I'm gonna pass on that one.
[16:59]Okay.
[17:00]I'll give you two passes.
[17:01]Okay.
[17:02]Okay.
[17:02]Product, you've used some high school.
[17:05]Clinique foundation, the same exact shade.
[17:08]Wow.
[17:09]But new new bottles up here.
[17:11]I know.
[17:12]I know.
[17:13]I think crusty, like, no.
[17:15]And Maybelline, great lash mascara in brown.
[17:18]And brown.
[17:19]Okay.
[17:21]Most worn out shoes.
[17:25]Now I would say my clogs or my converse,
[17:28]all star sneakers.
[17:30]Favorite candy?
[17:32]Reese is being a better cup.
[17:34]Oldest item in your wardrobe.
[17:37]Items for my mom.
[17:40]On your nightstand.
[17:42]Picture of my daughter and lip balm.
[17:45]How old is your daughter?
[17:46]Five.
[17:47]Oh, I have a favor.
[17:49]Favorite place in the world.
[17:52]Keep cod.
[17:53]What this Italy is the second runner up.
[17:57]Favorite season.
[18:00]Summer.
[18:01]Two.
[18:02]Book, you keep close and refer to you often.
[18:05]Classic style.
[18:06]Classic style.
[18:07]I can't tell you what to say.
[18:08]All of my, I say this in the book.
[18:10]I keep a well edited collection of self-help books
[18:16]nearby whenever I feel lost and they're heavily
[18:20]underlined, dog-eared.
[18:22]Lots of notes written in the margins.
[18:25]What's it good?
[18:26]But also I would say cookbooks because I love to cook
[18:30]and I tend to only keep books around that I really use
[18:34]and read and it's sort of like in your wardrobe
[18:37]with, there's exceptions.
[18:39]But like if you haven't read something in six months
[18:41]to a year or referred to it,
[18:44]consider sharing it with a friend or donate it to a library.
[18:48]Hey, you wrote in your book.
[18:50]As a rule, I generally don't keep novels around.
[18:52]I lend them to friends or I borrow them from libraries.
[18:54]Books need circulation.
[18:55]Find your own measure for keeping books at bay
[18:58]and apply it ruthlessly.
[18:59]Books are meant to be shared.
[19:00]Loved and used, not collect dust.
[19:02]I thought that was so interesting
[19:03]because I feel like keeping my favorite novels around,
[19:06]it's like kind of like the characters kind of greet me
[19:10]if I look at them, I know that sounds ridiculous.
[19:12]No, it does not.
[19:13]For me, I'm a, I have this thing with books
[19:16]where I really like to read my own category.
[19:19]I call applicable knowledge.
[19:21]Okay.
[19:22]So I really like books that teach that show you how to do something,
[19:28]for example, cookbook, self-help book,
[19:31]book of meditation, for example.
[19:34]And any kind of design book where there's big monographs
[19:39]with photographs and images that I can refer back to
[19:41]that are sort of like history related.
[19:44]Novels to me, I have so many favorite novels.
[19:49]I love Jonathan Franzen.
[19:52]I love Donna Tarte.
[19:55]And for me, reading a novel is like watching a movie and...
[20:00]And when it's done, I'm not gonna like pick up a novel,
[20:06]be like, what was that one concept in maybe I would?
[20:09]But for me, they're like movies.
[20:11]I was never the kind of person who had a DVD
[20:13]of every movie they loved.
[20:15]You know, it's like, you see it.
[20:17]And then you let it have a life afterwards.
[20:21]I like that.
[20:22]I definitely have a large library of books,
[20:25]but I don't just keep everything
[20:26]because I write it once.
[20:28]Right.
[20:31]So you told a funny story in the book
[20:33]about how you met your husband,
[20:35]how you said you met him that, quote,
[20:38]a dinner party on a freezing January night,
[20:40]the kind of night you went to bail
[20:42]and all your plans because you'd rather stay home
[20:43]once you be and eat a burrito on the couch.
[20:45]But I brave the cold because I believe in showing up
[20:47]and I needed some cheer during the winter gloom.
[20:50]So tell me about that.
[20:51]What else can I tell you?
[20:53]Well, I walked into the dinner party.
[20:56]It was small.
[20:58]I think there was like eight or nine of us.
[21:00]And I wasn't set up with him.
[21:02]I actually was under the impression
[21:04]that he was with somebody else.
[21:07]And he walked in and he was just,
[21:13]he had a certain luck.
[21:15]And I just thought, oh, he's not available, you know?
[21:19]And his best friend was also there.
[21:22]And we just had like a great night.
[21:24]We ended up being, we ended up doing vodka shots
[21:30]and dancing to the re pandora station.
[21:34]It was in 2009.
[21:35]And then he ended up going home early
[21:39]because he had a meeting in the morning
[21:40]and he needed to be fresh and ready for the meeting.
[21:43]So I was like, okay, you know, no big deal.
[21:46]And then his best friend and my best friend
[21:50]are also really good friends.
[21:52]And they kind of played Cupid.
[21:53]And they were telling him that I liked him
[21:55]and they were telling him me that he liked me.
[21:58]And we got together for several more group bunches.
[22:02]And then I think after the second or third one was history.
[22:07]And I like how that came at the end
[22:08]when you were saying how you had this big sort of party girl,
[22:11]like it girl type existence for a long time
[22:13]out every single night, every benefit,
[22:16]every fashion event and everything.
[22:18]And that you were just ready.
[22:20]You just, it was like time.
[22:21]I was ready before I met him.
[22:22]Okay.
[22:23]Sure, I was, for those of you who are out there
[22:26]who are listening, it wasn't as like effortless
[22:30]or, you know, definitely I had been in a period
[22:32]of my life for several years.
[22:35]I was ready for that transition.
[22:38]Well, it sounds, it was definitely fun
[22:39]to read about your life prior.
[22:42]Yeah, it was a, it was a totally different life.
[22:44]I'm so glad I have that in the past.
[22:48]Yeah.
[22:48]Yeah.
[22:50]Do you, does your daughter love to paint?
[22:52]Like do you do the watercolors with her?
[22:54]I do think that she loves to be outside.
[22:57]So in the winter time when it's freezing
[22:59]and we're in New York,
[23:02]I feel that I end up doing,
[23:05]she does a lot of art and stuff at school.
[23:08]And I don't paint with her as much as I feel like one would think
[23:12]or sometimes I'm hard on myself.
[23:14]I think I should paint more with her.
[23:16]But I certainly, there's art supplies everywhere.
[23:20]And we do paint and draw.
[23:24]I mean, she's painting and drawing all the time every day.
[23:28]So I do it with her as much as possible.
[23:30]And I like to visit her school,
[23:34]maybe once a year, twice a year,
[23:35]and do art projects with the whole class.
[23:37]So fun.
[23:38]Like last year we did, brought in some real sunflowers
[23:42]and we inspired by Matisse.
[23:45]We did paper cutouts with, we made sunflowers.
[23:48]It needs to be kind of my kids.
[23:49]It's a little preschool project.
[23:51]It's so cute.
[23:52]And then we made a teacher,
[23:53]made a book of all the different artwork afterwards.
[23:56]But my daughter is an athlete
[24:00]and she loves to run around.
[24:02]So just swim and just be outdoors.
[24:07]It's always like when can we go outside?
[24:10]And are you still close to your siblings?
[24:12]I feel like I wanted to know more about them.
[24:14]I feel like you need like a following book about,
[24:16]like maybe there's one chapter from Eve.
[24:18]You don't have books to like one chapter from each year
[24:20]siblings, parents, then we go back
[24:23]and then you like tie it all together.
[24:25]Because I felt like my curiosity was so piqued
[24:27]about what they were like,
[24:28]because you would say just like a few things
[24:30]about each sibling.
[24:31]And it's one of those classic situations
[24:34]with siblings where everyone sees us
[24:38]and I'm constantly being mistaken for my two sisters.
[24:41]We all kind of look alike and we all get along.
[24:47]We also are all very different.
[24:50]And it's like, I think the older we get,
[24:52]we all have very different lives.
[24:55]But we spend summers together and it's good.
[24:59]It's just, you know, it's like any family.
[25:00]I feel like the more time you spend together,
[25:03]the more sometimes things come up.
[25:06]And that's a good problem to have.
[25:10]You know, we're a very open family.
[25:12]We talk about everything.
[25:14]We face everything.
[25:18]We, I think we're very emotionally evolved family.
[25:23]And there was never like a taboo topic
[25:26]or something that was not dealt with.
[25:31]At least that's how I feel.
[25:33]You know, I feel like with a good and the bad
[25:36]when there's problems and when there's great joys in our life,
[25:39]like we do come together.
[25:41]It's great.
[25:42]And I've noticed that with all of your paintings of objects,
[25:46]I haven't, I can't even think of a painting
[25:48]you've done of a person.
[25:50]That's very good of you if you notice that
[25:52]because I have done a lot of commissions.
[25:56]People often commission me to paint their children
[25:58]or, and I'm very specific about what I'll agree to do.
[26:02]And then I always suggest a specific way to paint them
[26:05]because there's an impressionism in my work.
[26:13]Sometimes my work can be more realistic,
[26:17]but there is, and there's just an impressionism
[26:18]that happens with watercolor.
[26:20]And I think portraits are so tricky.
[26:23]I think they're, I think figurative painting
[26:26]is so much more interesting when it's impressionistic.
[26:30]But there's an expectation when somebody hires you
[26:33]to paint a commission of your daughter or your son,
[26:37]they're expecting it to look a certain way.
[26:40]Or I think, you know, a portrait is beautiful
[26:42]that Matisse paints or Van Gogh paints,
[26:45]where like there's a, there's a likeness,
[26:47]but there's not a photo likeness.
[26:50]I think photography is so much better for capturing that, actually.
[26:55]I feel like it's almost a waste.
[26:57]Like I would want you to, I would want you to paint
[27:00]like my daughter's lovey or my other daughter.
[27:03]Which I also do.
[27:04]Do you know what I mean?
[27:05]Like if I were trying to capture my kid, you style, you know?
[27:08]Cause you just like somehow the objects speak more
[27:11]sometimes about the person.
[27:12]Yeah, it's the things that you don't even realize.
[27:14]It's like, you know, the torn blankie that looks like Swiss cheese
[27:19]that kind of looks dirty and disgusting.
[27:23]But that's the most important objects to your child.
[27:27]Or, and like that clock you do,
[27:29]you've painted it with your dad's.
[27:30]My dad had that clock in the 80s.
[27:32]The bronze little black one.
[27:33]Are we going all over our house?
[27:34]Oh my gosh, I haven't seen it since probably 1989 or something.
[27:38]Anyway, my dad is a second when he's like, Kate,
[27:41]if you ever see these in New York,
[27:42]cause I'll tell.
[27:43]I'll be like, sometimes you can find these at like Moogie
[27:45]or some store in Chinatown.
[27:48]The MoMA design store.
[27:50]And he's like, if you ever see them in your buy me like 10
[27:53]of them, I want to give them the stocking stuffers.
[27:57]But we have them in like almost every room of our house.
[28:00]Well, most of, I keep, I don't wear a watch,
[28:03]but I keep a clock in the bathroom.
[28:06]Because we all have computers and phones now,
[28:08]so that's a good time teller.
[28:10]But the bathroom is really where I find that you're most
[28:14]thinking about time,
[28:15]cause you're usually going to bed or waking up
[28:17]and needing to leave the house.
[28:19]Yeah.
[28:20]So I don't keep a clock in the bedroom,
[28:22]cause I feel like that's stressful.
[28:23]I don't like to hear the, to, to, to, to, to, to.
[28:27]And do you have any plans to do any other books?
[28:33]There was a time where my friend Marina and I were thinking
[28:37]of doing a children's book together
[28:40]that she was gonna write and I was gonna illustrate.
[28:42]But I kind of had to focus on getting classic style out first.
[28:48]And then I realized that it was like having a second child
[28:52]with this book, it took me a long time
[28:56]to recuperate from all of the work.
[28:59]And then, you know, a good solid year of book signings
[29:05]and press and we were very fortunate
[29:08]with all of the love we got for the book.
[29:12]But then afterwards I was like, whoa, this really,
[29:15]this really was a, it really impacted my life.
[29:18]And I just needed to give it that space.
[29:22]So my agent gave me great advice she said,
[29:26]don't write a book, just write a book, write a book
[29:28]because you have something to say.
[29:30]And so while I didn't know what I was trying to say
[29:32]when I started to write this book, I knew I had a voice
[29:35]and I had something to get out.
[29:38]And so I have thought about writing classic home
[29:43]and then classic travel because those are, you know,
[29:45]two other things I'm so passionate about.
[29:48]I love interior design and architecture.
[29:51]And I talk a lot about that in classic style.
[29:53]And I also love to travel and I also talk about that.
[29:55]And traveling influences my work so much because
[30:00]We're constantly aware of tiny little details
[30:04]When we arrive in a new place that we would take for granted if it were the street that we pass, you know
[30:10]The house we pass every single day of our life
[30:13]You're not gonna notice as much as you know, for example like if you get off the subway in Paris
[30:19]You're gonna notice that there subway signage is different than our subway signage in New York, or those little blue and namal
[30:27]Address numbers are in the side of buildings like I just love all those tiny little details that maybe people don't notice
[30:34]But that's to me the soul of a place
[30:38]Well, thank you so much. Thank you
[30:41]I'm really love your work and again the book is classic style
[30:45]Amazing book to read to give is a gift. Yes. Thank you. All right. Thanks
[30:50]This episode of mom's don't have time to read books. It's been sponsored by the craft studio craft studio
[30:55]ncr.com