But although the technology may have changed, the images recorded, remain there for us to frame and place on the tops of our pianos, television cabinets, console tables and night tables or to hang on the walls – and on any wall we choose.
I have many such captured memories, and housing them in frames, be they silver frames from the Victorian era or "now" frames from Tiffany & Co. So many frames are out there in the stores – frames covered in fabrics, frames of steel, frames of mirror, frames bejeweled, frames of shells, frames of wood. The frames are of different shapes and sizes, from rounds to rectangles, hearts and squares. And there are tabletop double-photo folding frames and frames that hold four pictures, as well as frames that hold 12 pictures and hang on the wall.
What a great gift frames make. I recently received from a childhood friend, Joan Diamond, in Delray Beach, three pictures of my family taken many years ago on a sailing trip. It was a great Christmas present, particularly for the photos but also for the thought that went into it. The photos were framed in silver and ready to sit on the window console in my office. Sending a photograph of a loved one to a loved one at Christmas is one thing to be cherished, but sending the photo fully framed and ready to display is an even-more-cherished way of saying "I love you."
Nellie Xinos, my public relations associate at my New York office, is putting together photograph albums of my family pictures that I shall give to my boys as a holiday gift. The photos in the album are of my late parents, their parents and early pictures of Yours Truly in a variety of places that my boys have never seen before – happy photos to give to my sons at this stage of their early adulthood.
If you are in a quandary about what to give a friend for Christmas this year, shop around the Palm Beaches for picture frames that are right for the photo you wish to frame. A photo of a young man or girl in cowboy gear might best look right in a frame of leather or even wood. A photo of your daughter at a beach in the Caribbean would look right in a frame of bamboo. A photo of Grandma and Grandpa at an anniversary party can be framed in silver. And a photo of that special loved one can be framed in a reflective Venetian-glass-style frame – one of those reproductions made in India that are so fanciful and special.
If you shop at any of the department stores these days, you'll find that there are hundreds of different style frames from which to choose – and choosing a frame for a portrait is even more special a task. My friend, the portrait painter Ralph Wolf Cowan, who resides in the Palm Beaches and who paints the likenesses of past icons like the late Grace Kelly and more recent idols like the late Princess Diana, is always selecting the right frames for his portraiture – sometimes frames covered in gold leaf, other times Baroque frames of black and gold and still other times frames of carved wood. But always, the frames complement the subjects in his works.
By the way, if any of my readers wish to give a special Christmas present to a family member that is out of the ordinary, I might suggest a sitting with Cowan for a portrait. I believe that portraits are an essential element of loving design in one's home, as remembrances of youth – or simply the time before Grandma became a grandma. But there is no time in life when a portrait shouldn't be painted, whether childhood, adulthood or senior adulthood: Portraits always bring memories into the home.
At this holiday time, remember that memories captured on film are memories that will stay forever. I love to continually change the photos in the frames in my home. I never throw the replaced photos away, of course. I simply keep them stored behind the new photo, so that I can bring forward what I placed behind at any time I wish. But then again, I rarely do this. I simply buy a new frame and place the new one next to the old! I never forget my old friends. They are friends forever.
This holiday season, think pictures in stand-up frames for a memory-filled gift.
Interior designer, author and columnist Carleton Varney is the president and owner of Dorothy Draper & Co. in New York City, one of the oldest established interior design firms in the United States. Varney's worldwide roster of clients includes many in Palm Beach. He welcomes decorating questions from readers. E-mail him at cvarney@dorothydraper.com or write to him at Carleton Varney, c/o Darrell Hofheinz, Palm Beach Daily News, 265 Royal Poinciana Way, Palm Beach 33480.
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source: palmbeachdailynews.com
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