Inter-Continental Hotels Public spaces Presentation techniques Design process Vintage luxury Restaurant / Bar design
PROJECT IDEAS:
Interior designer and design editor Sarah Tomerlin Lee began her career as a copywriter and distinguished herself through a literary prose style and knowledge of history, which she brought to the myriad projects she worked on, including feature articles for Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar. Later, as an advertising executive, Lee was responsible for creating some of the more recognizable campaigns of her time. It was while advising Elizabeth Arden that Lee designed the “Red Door” promotional campaign, using the spa’s famous painted red doors in their packaging and promotional materials. Lee was also responsible for writing the tag line, “Just wear a smile… and a Jantzen," a popular and long-running campaign for the self-same swimwear company.
In 1959 Lee was appointed Vice President of Lord & Taylor. Managing a staff of more than eighty writers, layout artists, and illustrators, she directed the advertising, public relations, display of store windows, and the store’s interior displays.
In January 1965 Lee was named editor-in chief of House Beautiful magazine. Lee’s six-year long editorship was marked by an effort to highlight individual interior designers, decorators, and craftsmen, turning them into household names.
Lee’s life and career were suddenly altered when, in July of 1971, her husband Tom Lee died from injuries sustained in an automobile accident. At the time, his firm, Tom Lee Ltd., was under contract to finish the interiors of the Inn on the Park hotel in Toronto, Canada. Although Lee had no experience or formal training in interior design, she assumed the Presidency of the firm and completed the project. Sarah Tomerlin Lee remained the President of Tom Lee Ltd. for the next three decades, designing the interiors of over forty hotels, inns, and clubs in the United States, nineteen of them in New York. The firm was well-known for their expertise in restoring historic hotels, most notably The Helmsley Palace in New York City, The Willard Hotel in Washington D.C., and The Bellevue Hotel in Philadelphia. Her projects also included contemporary spaces such as The Parker Meridian in New York City, The Doral Saturnalia Spa in Miami, and The New Orleans Meridian. When Tom Lee Ltd. merged with the architectural firm Beyer Blinder and Belle in 1993, Lee became President of the Hospitality Division of the Interior Design department until her retirement in 1997.
Joseph Grusczak attended the Straubenmuller Textile High School in New York City from 1950-1952, where he majored in Interior Design, Drafting, and Illustration. The year he graduated, Grusczak won First Place Gold Medal in the city-wide Fine Arts Competition sponsored by the New York City School Art League. This award also won him a full tuition scholarship to NYSID where he studied Architectural and Interior Design and graduated with a Degree in Design in 1956 (class photo above).
From 1956-1960, Grusczak worked for a number of New York-based interior designers and decorators, including Melanie Kahane Associates in the role of Assistant Designer and Illustrator, primarily working on high-end residential projects. In 1961, Grusczak established Charterhouse Designs, Ltd., a fabric and wallcoverings manufacturing business which engaged in custom printing. The company catered to designers, architects and home furnishings consultants and had a total of twenty-one showrooms in cities across the United States, Europe, and the Caribbean.
In 1966, Grusczak also established G.B. Designs., an interior and architectural design firm working on high-end residential as well as contract projects, some of which required full architectural design capabilities. It was at this point in his career that Grusczak began to design projects on behalf of Inter-Continental Hotels with his business partner James Ray Baker.
G. B. Designs disbanded in 1972, and it wasn’t until 1976 that Grusczak would work again for the Inter-Continental Hotel Corporation, returning at the invitation of Neal A. Prince, the Vice President of Graphic and Interior Design.. Thus began a business relationship which lasted from 1976-1998.
Throughout his career in hospitality design, Grusczak simultaneously completed residential projects--many of which required both architectural and interior design services--within the United States and also in such places as Jumera, Dubai; Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; and Lausanne, Switzerland. Grusczak’s prolific and meticulous design talent merited him numerous awards and honors. Grusczak's extensive archives at NYSID include hundreds of drafted drawings, photographs, and many beautifully executed renderings such as the ones seen here.
