DAN'S PAPERS, July 4, 2008 Page 162 www.danshamptons.com
Design & Décor
Choose Candlelight for Elegant Entertainment
Photos by S. Galardi
By Mary Beth Karoll credulous company that thrift-shop In examining the most abstruse yet tableware is a family heirloom, amusing dining room lore for this artiMelamine is Meissen, stainless steel is cle, we were inspired by “Directions to estate silver, and cut glass is Christofle Dinner-Givers,” a tongue-in-cheek crystal. A piquant atmosphere, a hazy piece from the past. Published in 1848 glow, can also work wonders if you are in The Albion, A Journal of News, and serving a savory Spam loaf in lieu of Politics and Literature, this witty guide honey-baked ham. Such shady frugalireflects our viewpoint that lighting, ty is increasingly the fashion in today’s even more than china or crystal or flattough economic times, and if your dinware or flowers, makes for a festive ing table isn’t brightly lit, food snobs dining room. A wise host or hostess will be foiled. from any era will closely heed the As for Shakespeare and Shelley, we clever directives of the anonymous are rather fond of quoting Hamlet’s sarauthor’s Rule Nine, “Light your table donic dismissal of the leftovers served modestly and umbrageously. Nothing at his parents’ wedding banquet, injures the eyes like the glare of a “Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral great many lamps and chandeliers. baked meats[Did coldly furnish forth You . . . may have a passage from the marriage tables.” Nonetheless, to Shakespeare or Shelley, on the charms follow the above Ninth Rule to the letof twilight, ready to quote. I need ter, the inquisitive Dan’s Papers readerscarcely add how much the aspect of a Candles to match food, or decor (right). A Mano Beach House, Bridgehampton ship must research appropriate verses great many of your dishes will probato shed a murky literary light on the subtablemates. A soft glow of tea lights and tapers erasbly be improved by shade; particularly ject of the evening’s entertainment. es the appearance of wrinkles far more expeditiously the most mysterious, those chef d’oeuvres of your In contrast, citing the poet Sylvia Plath as a and economically than costly Crèème de Mer or some cook, which combine the advantages of at once rationale for candlelit dining would be a rather bold, other trendy salve. piquing curiosity and repressing appetite.” avant-garde gesture. Her 1962 poem, By Judiciously placed candles mask a variety of ills Indeed, only the grossly common and the uncomCandlelight, seems to describe her violently passionranging from stained tablecloths to fallen souffléés. monly fastidious that need to actually discern what ate marriage to Ted Hughes, “The mirror floats us at If you cast the mesmerizing spell of candlelight, your they are eating would take umbrage at a shadowy one candle power./ This is the fluid in which we meet guests may not be able to decipher your child’s craydining room. After all, candlelight is sublimely flateach other, /This haloey radiance that seems to on scrawls on the walls or make out the marks tering to anyone’s complexion. Its seductive flicker breathe/ And lets our shadows wither/ Only to blow/ stamped on the back of your porcelain. Thus, in the adds a sparkle to the eye otherwise dulled by the Them huge again, violent giants on the wall./ One dim radiance you might be able to convince your tiresomely self-referential conversation of one’s (continued on next page)
1145732