MAKING NEW YORK CITY WORK...

What is behind this door?

London

Buckingham Palace

Clarence House

Annabel's

"To make New York City work, you have to leave every two months

for at least two weeks"

-Eleanor Lambert

Anyone who has lived in New York knows that the city can become a bit overbearing if you get stuck here too many weeks in a row without a break. I heard Miss Lambert claim that her love of New York endured due to the fact that every two months, she escaped the city for at least two weeks. I once asked her when she started following that rule and she told me: "After the War." I asked her which war and she rolled her eyes. She meant The War -- World War 2.

Miss Lambert usually took more than two weeks in the summer... escaping the city in late May or early June for the whole summer. Her first stop - London.

London always offered numerous choices of places to stay -- Buckingham Palace... Clarence House -- in those days, that was the Queen Mother's residence... but more often than not, Miss Lambert liked to stay with her friend and client Mark Birley behind that blue door at Annabel's.