Author Information

Isabel Carmichael
Writer, Calendar Editor

ic@ehstar.com

Articles by this author:

  • Hidden in Sag Harbor
    Not every old house that gets snapped up on the South Fork is razed to make way for a bigger one. Especially not in Sag Harbor, and especially not the house Alex Matthiessen bought in 2002.
    By:
  • The Secret Gardener

    Victoria Fensterer has been reimagining East Hampton gardens for a long time. She came to attention here when she brought the grounds at the infamous estate known as Grey Gardens back to their former glory, and she has been focusing on secret gardens, from Amagansett to Quogue, ever since. 

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Adrian Nivola: A Way of Seeing
    Made with wire, aluminum, string, acrylic, linen, brass, silk, wood, and even watch parts, Adrian Nivola's sculptures are elegant three-dimensional drawings evoking the draftsmanship of Saul Steinberg, the mobiles of Alexander Calder, and the paintings of Joan Miro.
    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Red, Green, and White: The Colors of Tradition

    Richard Udice uses only red ornaments. A designer who loves Christmas, Mr. Udice decorates C. Whitmore’s Gardens every year and helps the shop’s clients choose flowers, accessories, and even clothing for the holidays.

    By:
  • Mary Daunt’s Pastels

    It was while driving back and forth from Montauk to her job at VJS Studio in East Hampton that Mary Daunt realized what an unusual landscape lies on either side of Montauk Highway and in Montauk generally. “The light is a lot more intense in the early fall. I prefer fall colors — there’s so much contrast between the red and green and the blue and orange.” Montauk’s landscape “is wilder,” she said.

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Anne Seelbach Sees Sea Life

    To hear Anne Seelbach talk about the painting, stencils, and bas-relief collages she’s been doing recently — “to bring awareness of the effects of industrial and chemical pollution on the marine environment” — one might easily conclude that she has become political, but it is not the case. “I am first an artist, not an activist,” she said at her Sag Harbor studio, adding, however, that “it is also true that I hope to bring awareness to nature as I see it.”

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Juxtaposing Planes and Angles

        What, you may well ask, could possibly be the connection between a lunar rover and bas-relief sculpture made by folding paper?

        On its face, there does not seem to be one, but once the demands of engineering and architecture are considered, a thread of continuity appears.

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Thriving on Fear, Being in the Moment

       The problem with acting in the theater, as opposed to film and television, is the live audience, Emily Mortimer said recently at the modest Amagansett farmhouse she and her husband, Alessandro Nivola, bought five years ago. “Everyone in the audience has paid for a ticket and suspended their disbelief; they’re counting on you and you’ve got only one shot. I’m always afraid I will break the illusion by shouting something like ‘Fuck the Queen.’ ”

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Oh, Where Was Willie?

        On the night of June 20, Jack Dougherty of Clearwater Beach went to bed early, figuring his beagle, Willie, would bed down under the deck as he usually did in the heat. The next morning, Willie did not turn up for breakfast.
        Mr. Dougherty walked  around his neighborhood on Ayrshire Place looking for the dog, but no one had seen him, not even the neighbors across the street whom Willie visits regularly.

    By: Isabel Carmichael
  • Saving a Mural Saved a House

       When Pietro Nivola and Katherine Stahl decided to move and reconstruct the house he inherited on Old Stone Highway in Springs, they may not have anticipated how complicated the project would be or that it would take five years.

    Click to See More photos

    By: Isabel Carmichael