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American designer William “Billy” Haines got his start as an actor, starring in silent films of the 1920s. But when he was blacklisted for being openly gay, he opted to shape Hollywood in another way: crafting the homes of its biggest executives and stars, from Joan Crawford and Gloria Swanson to Warner Brothers’ Jack L. Warner. In his Hollywood Regency interiors, which mixed historical furnishings with modern, Deco-inflected forms, he often employed custom-made “hostess chairs” that hovered just above the floor.
A 1959 party picture at Betsy Bloomingdale’s Haines-designed Holmby Hills villa captures them in action. The socialite (later dubbed “First Friend” for her close relationship with Nancy Reagan) and her glamorous pals perch on low stools and chairs in a posture that feels uniquely suited for cocktails and gossip. “He designed all of my pieces low to the floor,” Bloomingdale later said. “That way the people were grander, not the furniture.”
One of the first examples of these low-lying seats, the Brentwood, distinguished by the exposed walnut wood structure on its back, debuted in Warner’s Beverly Hills screening room in 1937. “He thought low chairs were better for social occasions and cocktail parties,” explains Greg Bianchini, production manager at William Haines Designs, which still makes these and other Haines designs to-order in Los Angeles. The earliest versions were made to each client’s specifications—Warner’s were a bit smaller than average, for example, to better suit the exec’s shorter stature. The design was specified for Frank Sinatra’s office, Haines’s own Brentwood home, and Sunnylands, the 1960s Rancho Mirage estate of philanthropists Walter and Leonore Annenberg.
“There’s a diminutive, slightly feminized structure to the chair that brings your horizon line down; it reminds you of a slower time and way of socializing,” muses interior designer Jamie Bush. While it can add historical punch to modern interiors, he says, “I don’t consider it timeless—on the contrary I feel that it marks an enchanting moment in LA design history.”
This story appears in the March issue. Never miss a story when you subscribe to AD.
