With her clean and colorful aesthetic, Tory Burch quickly became a household name. In the midst of running her eponymous brand, as well as the Tory Burch Foundation, which supports female entrepreneurs, it’s the quiet moments surrounded by her family that she treasures most.

What artists inspire you?

I was an art history major and art is always an inspiration in our collections, from Picasso and Brancusi to Eggleston and Fontana. Matisse is one of my all-time favorite artists—he had an incredible sense of color and texture. I would love to know how he saw the world.

What do you collect?

My mother collects blue-and-white porcelain and has passed on her love of it to me. We once spent an entire day in Tokyo looking for pieces of Imari  [porcelain].

What imagery do you associate with the holidays?

Our tree. We decorate it with a mix of new and antique ornaments that have been passed down—and we always have peacocks for a pop of color.

Do you like to get away for the holidays or spend them at home?

As long as I am with my family I am happy to be home or away. New York is so festive and beautiful around Christmas, but it’s also a great time to travel.

Do you have a favorite holiday tradition from childhood that you share now with your kids?

My entire family gets together for a few days around Thanksgiving, playing sports, having hours-long dinners and listening to music. My mother always overdoes it with dessert table—pies, cookies [and] croquembouche.

What kind of gifts do you treasure most?

The most meaningful gifts are personal. I always wear the sunflower pendant my father gave me—he had it made for his mother and eventually gave it to me. More recently, my boys gave me spray-painted flowers for Valentine’s Day—creative and long-lasting!

After one of the busiest years of his 30-year acting career – including roles on Portlandia,  The Good Wife, and starring in NBC’s new series, Believe – Kyle MacLachlan likes to relax during the holiday season. Last year, the star of cult favorites like Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks traveled with his wife and five-year-old son to his native Washington State, where MacLachlan indulges his epicurean passions at his acclaimed winery, Pursued By Bear. For a David Lynch favorite, his holiday plans couldn’t be more normal: Christmas cookies, Champagne, and Charlie Brown. We interviewed the actor and wine buff on his holiday traditions last year, and we’re revisiting the interview below, during our Warholiday online auction (1-12 December).

Where are you spending the holidays this year?

We’re actually going to be spending Christmas with my brothers and their families over in the Seattle area but we usually go to Yakima [Washington], where I’m from.  Eastern Washington has a different kind of beauty in the winter months. It’s cold and stark, but special to me.

Can you think of any favorite gifts you’ve received over the years?

When my brothers and I get together during Christmas we always bring up some of the gifts we received as kids. One of our favorites was called ‘The Thing-Maker’. It was basically a hot plate with an insert where you could fit a metal plate with bug forms in it. You’d fill the template with liquid plastic and stick it into the hot plate and the bug forms would ‘cook’ and harden. I can’t imagine they’d ever let a company sell something like this today, but we loved it. You learned pretty quickly not burn your hand or breathe too deeply when the plastic was cooking.

Any holiday traditions you’ve passed down you your son?

When I was little, we used to go to my grandparents’ during the holidays. My grandmother was German and would make Christmas cookies with my two brothers and me. There were the ones she did and the ones we did — the ones she did were the ones you wanted to eat! — but it started my love of cooking.  I’m starting to revisit this with my son; he likes helping in the kitchen and we try to include him as much as we can. He loves decorating the cookies — frosting everywhere!

Is there something you like to watch, or listen to, every holiday season?

Without question, as a family we like to visit memory lane.  For us that means always watching ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’, ‘Charlie Brown Christmas’, ‘Frosty the Snowman’ and ‘The Grinch Who Stole Christmas’. Not many people realize that the voice of the Grinch — and the narrator — was Boris Karloff.

What’s the perfect wine for a holiday dinner?

Actually I might plug my Syrah, Baby Bear, because it’s got a little bit of spice to it. All in all, I think Champagne works very well during the holidays!

Do you have a favorite holiday sweater? You can be honest — do you dress up your two dogs?

I don’t have a favorite holiday sweater, but I do like the cold weather of New York in winter. And I’m not above putting some fuzzy antlers on the dogs’ heads.

( Photo courtesy of Paul Jasmin.)

Who could match Andy Warhol’s enigmatic appeal as the arbiter of downtown cool? According to David Colman of the New York Times, “If ever there was anyone who could out Warhol- Andy Warhol, it [was] Marisol Escobar.”

Escobar appeared in two of Warhol’s earliest films: The 13 Most Beautiful Girls and The Kiss.  Like Andy’s other singly-named muses –Jackie, Liz, and Marilyn– Marisol was a fixture on the lively New York art scene. Warhol described her as “the first girl artist with glamour.” But she was more than just a pretty face.

Marisol first experienced success as an Abstract Expressionist painter studying under Hans Hoffman, having her first solo exhibition in 1958 at the Leo Castelli Gallery. During this time she hung out with the likes of Mark Rothko and Willem de Kooning.  Recalling an art scene dominated by abstraction in POPism: The Warhol Sixties, Andy writes:

“The resentment against Pop artists was something fierce, and it wasn’t coming from just art critics or buyers, it was coming from a lot of the older Abstract Expressionist painters themselves. The attitude was brought home to me in a very dramatic way at a party given by an Abstract Expressionist painter, Yvonne Thomas… Marisol had been invited, and she took Bob Indiana and me with her… When we walked into that room, I looked around and saw that it was chock full of anguished, heavy intellects. Suddenly the noise level dropped and everyone turned to look at us. (It was like the moment when the little girl in The Exorcist walks into her mother’s party and pees on the rug.) I saw Mark Rothko take the hostess aside and I heard him accuse her of treachery: ‘How could you let them in?’ She apologized. ‘But what can I do?’ she told Rothko. ‘They came with Marisol.'”

In an exhibition currently on view until June 15, 2014, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, you can see side-by-side works by the two artists that explore their friendship at a time when both were still in the early stages of their careers. In her work, Marisol turns away from the solemnity of Abstract Expressionism to humor, which she injects in her now signature sculptures—life size wooden assemblages carved and plaster-cast repeatedly with her face in Self Portrait.  “It started as a kind of rebellion. Everything was so serious,” the artist said in a 1965 interview with the New York Times. “I was very sad myself and the people I met were so depressing. I started doing something funny so that I would become happier — and it worked.”

Andy, for his part, used modes of repetition that helped define the Pop movement, such as a row of eight Jackie Kennedys in a piece entitled, Jackie Frieze. He said, “The Pop artists did images that anybody walking down Broadway could recognize in a split second—comics, picnic tables, men’s trousers, celebrities, shower curtains, refrigerators, coke bottles—all the great modern things that the Abstract Expressionists tried so hard not to notice at all.”

MCA DNA: Warhol and Marisol 
Sep 21, 2013–Jun 15, 2014

(Article by Christine Villanueva; Image: Marisol Escobar (b. 1930), “Andy”, graphite, oil and plaster on wood with Andy Warhol’s shoes 56½ x 17¼ x 22½ in. Executed in 1962-1963.) 

“I think that probably the most relevant experience that I have [had] in New York was the creation of Studio 54,” Carmen D’Alessio told us. Andy Warhol once wrote of the influential Peruvian club promoter: “Carmen has a list. Her list is worth a fortune. She has the names (spelled correctly), the addresses (summer, winter, city, and country), and the phone numbers (with area codes) of everyone beautiful, young, and loaded.” (A. Warhol, Exposures, London, 1979.)

Over thirty years later, D’Alessio still knows what makes a great party, as evidenced by her appearances at noteworthy club openings near and far. We asked the queen of the scene about her thoughts on Warhol in advance of our Entertainers sale, which runs from October 16-30; the results are below.

What was your first Warholian moment, and when did you first encounter him?

In Rome in 1970 when he was filming [Andy Warhol’s] Frankenstein.

What or who would be Andy’s muse if he were alive today?

Lady Gaga.

What are your latest cultural obsessions?

The work of young artists.

What would you consider Warhol’s most memorable quote or anthem?

“In the future, everybody will be world-famous for 15 minutes.”

If you could collaborate with Andy on a project, what would it be?

A model Agency called Twinkie (we both loved the young ones).

Dream dinner-party: you, Warhol, and…?

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Whose portrait would Andy most want to do now?

Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge.

Soup can or coke bottle?

Soup can.

Drag every day or only on special occasions?

From time to time.

(Image, right: Taken at Studio 54, courtesy of Christie’s; image below: Ms. D’Alessio now.)

A prominent feature in Tabitha Simmons and Craig McDean’s Manhattan town house is a shoe sketch by Andy Warhol. Simmons, the cult shoe designer and avid collector of daring heels, is obviously a fan of Warhol’s early fashion illustrations, many of which can be seen in our latest online-only sale here.

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Shoe
ink and tempera on paper
10 3/8 x 9 3/4 in. (26.4 x 24.8 cm.)
Drawn circa 1955.

In honor of Andy, Simmons offered us some of her shoe sketches from her Autumn/Winter 2013 collection. See the results below.

AW 2013 Bailey sketch

AW 2013 Harmony sketch

AW 2013 Hermoine sketch

AW 2013 Hope sketch

“If I’m not going to wear it then why would anyone else?” Tabitha Simmons muses in an interview last year with Elle. The English shoe designer and contributing editor at Vogue has been busy these past few months, even finding time to collaborate with Toms to create a signature design for the popular shoe-tailer . This willingness to play with high and low is why we love Simmons, and also why we think she and Andy would get along. Below are her thoughts on love, design, and who would be the new Edie.

What was your first Warholian moment, and when did you first encounter him?

I fell in love with him during my time at art college.

What are your latest cultural obsessions?

Cara Delevingne; she has that Edie Sedgwick look mixed with great style and a fun and mischievous personality, [and] the iPhone game app Candy Crush.

What would you consider Warhol’s most memorable quote or anthem?

“People should fall in love with there eyes closed.”

If you could collaborate with Andy on a project, what would it be? 

To design a shoe for my collection.

Dream night out on the town: you, Warhol, and…? 

Basquiat, Adam Ant in his 20s, Elizabeth Taylor & Richard Burton, Ryan Gosling.

Imagine Warhol had a Twitter account. What kind of thing might he say in 140 characters or less?

“So what?”

Whose portrait would Andy most want to do now? 

Beyoncé.

Soup can or coke bottle?

Coke bottle.

Drag every day or only on special occasions?

Special occasions.