When Cameron Smith first shared the idea of a vintage design gallery with his backer, he was met with incredulity. “He was like, ‘I believe in you, but I’m gonna give it three months,’” the Galerie Half founder tells Surface. Fortunately, Smith likes a challenge. He launched with the vision of curating a stylish blend of 20th-century furniture, European antiques, and eclectic rarities imbued with a sense of timelessness that converge within a single place. In one corner, a Roman statue flanks a bleached Gustavian daybed; a nearby vignette’s Venetian mirror reflects African masks. The seductive curve of Carlo Mollino’s Suora lamp mimics a marble stool by Rick Owens; the timeworn patina of a glazed terracotta planter nods to the softened leather of an Advocate and Press Chair by Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret.

By artfully placing objects with disparate design traditions next to each other, uncharted avenues of beauty emerge. That may not register as quite a radical proposition in the age of Instagram, where an endless scroll of pristine interiors inevitably awaits. The alchemy that Smith has mastered, though, predates the feed and eschews any sort of algorithm. His curatorial eye developed at a young age, by accompanying his mother to flea markets and being instructed to pick out objects that spoke to him. Decades later, he wields that approach with ease when traveling the world to source his next find. What he picks is deceptively simple: “What would go in my house is what’s on the floor,” he says. “I’ve never swayed from that.”

It’s an approach that has served him well. Over the past decade, Galerie Half has emerged as one of the premier vintage design galleries in Los Angeles. Its Melrose Arts District storefront regularly attracts such high-profile clients as Ellen DeGeneres, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, who have leaned on his expertise to help furnish The Row’s boutiques with rare, timeworn furnishings that impart a restrained elegance in dialogue with the garments. The mélange of luxurious and humble touches is palpable in the gallery, where a home-like ethos pervades for both himself and his tight-knit team.

While no two visits to Galerie Half are the same, Smith has spent the past four years documenting the hundreds of pieces that have cycled through the gallery for his first-ever book. Galerie Half: Selected Works/Spaces, out through Flammarion this month, journeys through the world’s design traditions from the eyes of a seasoned curator who makes them all coexist harmoniously.

In an interview with Surface, he talks about the pitfalls of sourcing online, the emotions of publishing a book, and why he’ll never be an interior designer.

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In just 250 square feet tucked between Manhattan’s Avenues B and C, Bar Miller seems purpose-made to stop passersby in their tracks. Burled oak walls and an aged tin ceiling enclose a scene-stealing jade green quartzite omakase bar that overlooks a lacquered maroon wine bar. Branding and design studio Polonsky and Friends prioritized the placement of artisan-made wares, from the bathroom’s lighting by Pablo Bolumar and Claire Dufournier, ceramics by Helen Levi and fefostudio, and Hollie M Kelley’s hand-painted wallpaper mural. The eight-seat counter serves a 15-course omakase that changes daily, but visitors can anticipate pairing dishes like pickled oysters in nori sauce and chawanmushi and smoked uni with an expressive beverage program of orange wines and unpasteurized sakes.

For more than 2,000 hours over the past six months, Parisian illustrator Ugo Gattoni has pored over two posters commissioned to promote the Olympic and Paralympic Games taking place in Paris this summer. Gattoni’s colorful vistas are often sought out by the likes of Hérmes, Audemars Piguet, Diptyque, and Ruinart, all of whom are recent collaborators. For the upcoming Summer Olympics, he used his cartoon-like style to render a pastel vision of the City of Light with playfulness and joy: a pink Eiffel Tower stands tall while nearby lapping waves reference the surfing competition that will take place thousands of miles away (Paris is, famously, landlocked).

Gattoni’s work, which was unveiled this past week at Musée d’Orsay, represents a more approachable way to promote the Games, in what Paris 2024 president Tony Estanguet describes as “posters that go beyond a mere logo.” But abstraction in the name of originality and festivity is a tough concept for scandalized French conservatives, who have decried the posters for “le wokisme” to grasp.

In his latest show, the photographic artist and self-proclaimed “eternal optimist” offers up happiness, the pursuit of harmony, and transformation in the face of unsettling forces.

Here, we ask an artist about the essential details behind one of their latest works.

Bio: Michael Dayton Hermann, 48, New York.

Title of work: REconstituted 2 (2024).

Where to see it: Baxter Street at Camera Club of New York.

Three words to describe this work: Post-truth. Tradition. Invention.

What was on your mind at the time: When developing this body of work, I was overwhelmed thinking about how systemic and intractable so many of society’s challenges are. I was also considering the paradox of how the forces that bring us together can also hold us back, and things that are familiar can hold the potential for rediscovery. I set out to make work that spoke to the relationship between tradition and invention as potentially harmonious forces, even in today’s polarized social and political climate.

Last week, friends of Surface gathered for a downtown dinner party hosted by designer Fernando Mastrangelo at the Tribeca outpost of Uruguayan cafe Mostrador, located in the Walker Hotel. During cocktail hour, guests mingled over specialty cocktails courtesy of Ardray blended scotch whisky and Hampton Water rosé before sitting down to a dinner menu crafted by Mostrador’s chef, Fernando Trocca. Tablescapes by Popup Florist and objets crafted by Mastrangelo surrounded the attendees as they indulged in an Ardray tasting experience and closed out the night with a dulce de leche flan for dessert.

When was it? Feb. 29

Where was it? Mostrador at the Walker Hotel, Tribeca

Who was there? Eva Zuckerman, Arielle Assouline-Lichten, Mark Grattan, Jared Heinrich, Christina De Leon, Loie Hollowell, Ted Lawson, Yuko Nishikawa, Catie Case, and more.

Amagansett’s The Reform Club feels like a well-manicured family estate rather than a hotel: boasting seven suites and three cottages that dot the grounds and for larger groups, a private four-bedroom home, called 21 House. All guestrooms are white and airy yet welcoming year-round, while spread-out privacy does not come at the expense of location: Reform Club is mere minutes from Amagansett town. Guests can expect a stellar art collection, beach cruisers, in-room spa appointments, and a dedicated concierge.

Surface Says: There’s a reason the in-the-know flock to the picket-fence idyll of Amagansett’s Reform Club: its five-acre grounds and art-filled accommodations attract privacy-minded creatives seeking to balance fun and respite.

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