
James Andrew – Lee Jofa
Just as my dear friend and legendary interior designer, Mario Buatta, had his signature chintz (i.e., Lee Jofa’s Floral Bouquet), I’m claiming Lee Jofa’s Garden Glories handblock, as mine! Well, don’t worry, this just-offered super-chic chintz is not exclusively mine, but I have become an instant fan, and in fact I’ve already sold it to three different clients! In one instance it’ll be used for curtains in an 1890’s townhouse guest room; in another, on a Louis XVI painted white bergère in a living room here in town; and in another instance, on a pair of Billy Baldwin slipper chairs for a client’s Amagansett beach house—three very different scenarios, but in each setting this versatile print adds a perfect, impossibly fresh jolt of color and pattern.

Lee Jofa’s Garden Glories
Garden Glories Handblock was originally called “Glories of the Garden,” and it was one of Lee Jofa’s most loved hand-blocked designs. Designed by S. Gordon Brown in 1949 with 134 hand blocks, it conjures up fantasies of the most exhuberant English summer garden with lupins, delphinium and tulips—a riot of ravishing color, and offers endless possibilites for creating the most sublime color palettes. By the 1960’s the original hand blocks had deteriorated and the print was transferred to a hand screen, but now thankfully the blocks have been restored and it has been re-introduced as a proper hand blocked chintz with all of the soul and character one expects from a hand-hewn Lee Jofa chintz.
I’m photographed at the Lee Jofa New York Showroom with a club chair upholstered in my signature “Garden Glories” chintz. I’m sporting a Ralph Lauren cream cotton cable knit cardigan, Tom Ford grey and white linen voile gingham check shirt, pale grey silk pants, tan suede loafers, reading glasses, vintage Rolex, and my fragrance is Creed Orange Spice.