342 SEPTEMBER 2019 VOGUE.COM
Milking It
“The enamel melted off my
bathtubs,” says Charlie Cascio,
the resident cheesemaker at Carmel Valley
Ranch. The artisan is describing the wildfires
that tore through his Big Sur ranch three years
ago, burning up 40 acres and decimating
the habitat his Swiss goats (“the ones with
the beards”) relied on. Enter Tim Wood, the
ranch’s head chef, who invited Cascio, a
French-trained former chef at the Esalen
Institute, and his tribe of four-footed friends
onto the resort’s property, located two
hours south of San Francisco. Now Cascio’s
creamery is one of the newest attractions,
offering an udder-to-urn exploration of what it
takes to get his chèvre to the ranch’s kitchens.
The California resort isn’t the only hotel
taking agro-tourism into the creamery realm.
Wyoming’s Brush Creek Ranch is preparing
for its own tribe of goats (and, potentially,
sheep) to arrive this fall, while currently
making cheese from imported milk. Guests,
says Sean FitzGerald, the RISD-educated
creamery manager, who’s been busy
boning up on a “700-page pasteurized-milk
ordinance” and researching the genetic
makeup of various goat lineages, will be
exposed to “what goes into the care of the
animals, and how a holistic approach is
really good for the environment and for the
cheese.” A goat that rambles is a goat that
makes flavorful milk, he explains: “If your
tribe gets into an onion patch, you will taste
it.” As of-the-moment as this barn-to-table
trend may seem, Cascio points out that it’s
an ancient tradition—and he’s more than
happy to facilitate the time-traveling. “We can
build the guests a shepherd’s crook,” he says.
“They can be with the herd like they would
have been 8,000 years ago.”—CHLOE SCHAMA
Two destination resorts open up creameries.
TRAVEL
RING
AROUND
FLORAL MOTIFS FROM
AN 18TH-CENTURY
VASE AND AN ANTIQUE
SETTEE INFLUENCED
THIS PLATE FROM
THE CECE BARFIELD X
MARKARIAN FOR
CHRISTIE’S HOME
COLLECTION.
DESIGN
Past Perfect
Twice a year, Christie’s hosts an interiors
sale: Items range from Louis XIV gilt
chairs to Meissen porcelain to Mughal
Empire–era inlays. But among the
antiques at this season’s sale, shoppers
will find something novel—a line
of homewares inspired by the auction
catalog and custom-made for the
occasion. It’s the first time Christie’s has
commissioned such a project, luring in
two tastemakers on the rise to spearhead
the capsule collection: fashion designer
Alexandra O’Neill of Markarian (a two-
year-old label whose romantic gowns
have floated all about town) and interior
designer CeCe Barfield Thompson (a
Bunny Williams Inc. alum who knows
a thing or two about chintz). “I was
having cocktails at the Lowell Hotel
with a friend from Christie’s,” explains
Thompson, “and she asked me if I had
heard of Markarian.” Unbeknownst to
the Christie’s employee, the two women
were already intimately entwined. They
attended NYU together; O’Neill was
Thompson’s maid of honor and is now
godmother to her daughter. The result
of their professional convergence is a
line of items that reference the past:
dishes (manufactured by Laboratorio
Paravicini) with a chrysanthemum
pattern influenced by the palampore
upholstery on an 18th-century settee,
and silk pillows (constructed at
Markarian’s garment-district factories)
with beaded embroidery meant to
evoke the florals on a Qianlong dynasty
vase. The items will be sold at Bergdorf
Goodman through September—no
bidding required.—lilah ramzi
GREENER PASTURES
CARMEL VALLEY
RANCH IS ONE OF
SEVERAL RESORTS
EMBRACING
AGRO-TOURISM.
VINE OF
BEAUTY
O’NEILL (FAR
LEFT) AND
THOMPSON WERE
SELECTED TO
MINE CHRISTIE’S
HOLDINGS FOR
VLIFE
PLATE: BRIAN MCCORMICK. TRAVEL: COURTESY OF CARMEL VALLEY RANCH. ALL OTHERS: COURTESY OF CHRISTIE’S IMAGES.
