I'll build a stairway to paradise A life of Bunny Mellon

Landscape historian Griswold (The Manor: Three Centuries at a Slave Plantation on Long Island) considers the life of heiress Rachel "Bunny" Lambert Mellon and her lasting influence on American horticulture and design in this impressive study. Incorporating thorough research and excerpts from Mellon's personal archive, Griswold captures America's changing social and cultural landscape through the eyes of a socialite who wanted to "always give something back." Born in New York City, in 1910, Mellon developed a love of simplicity and nature from her grandfather. In 1948, she married Paul Mellon, co-heir to the fortune of Mellon Bank. Inspired by such designer friends as Jean Schlumberger and Hubert de Givenchy, Mellon honed a discerning eye for classic style, shaped her husband's world-renowned art collection, and conceptualized understated home interiors and gardens. In the 1960s, John F. Kennedy hired Mellon to craft a rose garden outside the Oval Office, and Jacqueline Kennedy hired her to restore White House interiors. After JFK's death, Mellon designed the eternal flame that burns at his Arlington National Cemetery grave site. Griswold's rich narrative highlights Mellon's extravagance, but avoids mythologizing: "Bunny was not a legend but a person." This is a fast-paced charmer for design enthusiasts and art mavens. Agent: Andrew Wylie, Wylie Agency. (Nov).

The landscapes of a privileged life. Landscape historian Griswold offers a warm portrait of her longtime friend Rachel Lambert "Bunny" Mellon (1910-2014), a noted garden designer and "icon of style." Born into wealth and luxury, Bunny grew up on curated estates: The gardens of her childhood home, for example, were created by the prestigious Olmsted firm. She married into even greater wealth: Her second husband was Paul Mellon, philanthropist and heir to the Mellon banking fortune. "In the Mellons' self-sufficient universe," Griswold observes, "acquiring the best became expected, ingrained, something to be done without remarking on the effort or the money it required." Their multiple homes were staffed by as many as 350 employees. Although their marriage soon fell apart, Paul assured Bunny that "she would have all the money she wanted." That money seemed limitless. Dressed by Balenciaga, bejeweled by Jean Schlumberger, Bunny had a wardrobe that cost close to $3 million per year in today's money. While Paul took a lifelong mistress and Bunny reveled in serial infatuations with "interesting and talented men--almost all gay," they remained married until Paul's death in 1999. Griswold follows Bunny's passions for art, gardens, and interior design, which led to her reputation as a woman of supreme good taste and imagination. Fashioning for herself a "hushed and extremely private domestic universe," her social world was glamorous: Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip came to tea, and Jackie Kennedy became a close friend. Bunny served on Jackie's White House Fine Arts Committee, redesigned the Rose Garden, and designed the landscaping for the JFK Library and Kennedy gravesite. Alongside achievements, though, were scandals and sorrows that challenged Bunny's "theatrical mastery" of her life. Acknowledging Bunny's insularity and emotional limitations, Griswold still admires her. What saved Bunny "from being a complacent, undereducated, rich society woman with time on her hands," she writes, "was her bottomless curiosity." A richly detailed rendering of a world of boundless extravagance. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.