Frances Elkins

Imagine – in 1926 – a room where a camelback sofa and some chairs were covered in peach-coloured
corduroy. That is a fair example of Frances Elkins’s fearless use of bold colour.
This quote is taken from Albert Hadley’s forward of Stephen M Salny’s book on Frances Elkins.
Today this purity of colour and simplicity of palette would be considered modern and unsurprising;
however, at that time, not long past interiors of Victorian excess, such an approach was innovative
and courageous.
Frances Elkins joined her brother, the Chicago based architect David Adler, abroad while he was
studying at the ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris from 1908- 1911. There she was introduced to several
“avant-gardes artisans”, including the work of Jean-Michel Frank and Alberto Giacometti. Frank’s
interiors and furnishings, along with Giacometti’s inspired creations still define forms and concepts
considered modern today, a century past their conception. With this inspiration, Francis Elkin’s
returned to the US to form her own distinct mark.
“Independent, revolutionary, avant-garde, strong-willed and convincing are but a few adjectives”
used to describe Francis Elkin. Her work layered textures, curves, luxurious materials such as vellum,
wood, metal, bolection door surrounds in Steuben glass and hand-painted paper with inventive
material, such as paved polished cork floors. To this, Francis Elkins added energy and interest by
mixing antiques with modern furniture, shapes and forms.
She is revered today as one of the twentieth centuries most legendary decorators, inspiring eminent
designers such as Billy Baldwin, who believed that she was “perhaps the most creative decorator we
ever had”. Whilst, the celebrated San Francisco designer Michael Taylor aptly stated that “her
genius was in doing it when she did.”