Ask a New Yorker: Charles Pavarini III- exuberant, contemporary, and fashionable.
You have a wonderful sense of rhythm in your design esthetic. But can you dance?
Charles: Can I dance? That’s what I started off doing. I came to the city
to dance classically. I did Chorus Line and many, many musicals. So yes, I can
dance. And I still can. Matter of fact I’ve gone back to dance. I’m
older and can’t do shows like Chorus Line and I have a thriving business.
So what I’ve done is I’ve gone back to study Tango.
Ask a New Yorker: Tango?
Charles: Difficult, very difficult. For years I have had the desire to learn the
Tango…..it is sexy, sensual and a beautiful dance! When you print my name
you need to put the third after my name, Roman numeral lll. Because there were
many before me, and if the Roman numeral lll is not after my name you’re
talking about my cousin.
Ask a New Yorker: Done. So who is Charles Pavarini lll?
Charles: Well I’m the grandson of the founder of Pavarini Construction Company,
who built Lincoln Center, the Seagram building, 66 Fifth Ave, Irving Trust, United
Nations, State Theater at Lincoln Center. So I have a New York legacy. When I
was six years old my father and grandfather and myself (all the three Charles’s)
were on top of the Seagram building to flag the building, to top it off. It was
in the late, late 50’s and I remember being petrified as a really young
kid. The building had no walls. So it was a little frightening to me.
Ask a New Yorker: Your state of balance and grace as a dancer kicked in.
Charles: Right. Maybe that’s where I get the dancing from, trying to stand
on top of the building.
Ask a New Yorker: That was a lovely overview of your family. But who is Charles
Pavarini lll?
Charles: Who am I? That’s a very interesting question because it’s
very hard to summarize who a person is or who self is. I think I’m multi-dimensional.
I now design interiors but I’m more than an interior designer. I’ve
designed clothing, costumes, stage sets, furniture, lighting, and textiles. I
just completed this summer designing sets for You’re A Good Man Charlie
Brown and Carousal at a regional theater in New Canaan, where I sit on the Board
of Directors…The Summer Theatre of New Canaan. I do lot of fund raising.
When you’re fortunate, and I feel extremely fortunate because I was given
a God given talent, I want to give back. I’ve raised hundreds of thousands
on my own for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids. I initiated the Kips Day Dinner
Dance Cruise 7 years ago and chair and run that every year. I’ve also done
Starlight Foundation, March of Dimes,God’s Love We Deliver on and on…
I always say interior design is what I do it’s not who I am. Who I am is
all the other stuff, the fundraising, the caring about other people, the concern
about community, family etc. http://www.pavarinidesign.com/index.html
Ask a New Yorker: Describe your room and what it looked like as a little boy.
Charles: We moved to Arizona when I was 8 years of age because my father took
a buy-out from Pavarini Construction. He moved us all to Arizona because he had
a hair-brained idea of building attached homes in the desert. He never realized
it because he passed away at 54 years old. But when we moved out there we were
very privileged. We had our own plane etc…we had this large house on Camelback
Mountain. At 8-9 year old I was working directly with an interior designer to
design my room. I got to pick everything out. I do remember that I was mad about
horses at that time. So my draperies and window treatments were horse prints.
Ask a New Yorker: Do you have a wish list of things you would like to design.
like perhaps a plane interior?
Charles: I do have a desire to do a plane interior. Right before my parents split
around 13 years old I was about to do the interior of our personal family plane.
That just didn’t work out. My dream is to also design yachts, my own line
of furniture, casino’s and night clubs. I most wish to design for Nicole
Kidman and Sandra Bullock.
Ask a New Yorker: You would have been the youngest to ever design a private jet.
Charles: I would have hoped so, but that’s long gone! What I would like
to do is design a yacht’s interior. My first Kips Bay room that I did, it
took me ten years to get into Kips Bay. After applying for nine years, that ninth
year I thought they were prejudice against Italians. That’s my Kips Bay
joke. The tenth year I got in. They gave me the smallest room in the house on
the sixth floor, 9 by 7 with 7 1/2 foot ceilings. I transformed the room into
a sitting room on a private yacht. That got a lot of play. I did get a job from
it but not a yacht interior. It kind of whet my appetite, so to speak, for doing
yachts and boats. http://www.kipsbaydecoratorshowhouse.org/
Ask a New Yorker: Let’s talk about Kips Bay. It’s a show house for
designers. How important are show houses for the success in the interior design
world?
Charles: Well I’m very passionate about Kips Bay, not only for what it does
for the interior designer, because I’ve seen Kips Bay, the Show House, actually
launch careers. But I’m passionate about it because Kips Bay embraces over
13,000 children in the metropolitan area. Twelve-hundred of the children are homeless.
When I found that out, that aspect of Kips Bay, I immediately came up with a fund
raiser for them. We’ve raised almost $400,000 in the past 6 years. It is
primarily a designer driven fund raiser. But Kips Bay itself, they acquire a mansion
and they give each designer a room and you can do what you will with the room.
Then they open it up to the public for 4 weeks. It is the premiere show house.
They actually coined the phrase “Show House” 40 years ago. We are
coming this spring to the 40th year, which I hope to be participating in. Just
last week Daniel Quintero, Director of Kips Bay, appointed me to the position
of Chairman of the Designer Committee. I am very enthusiastic to accept this prestigious
position and to work for the charity thry the Design Industry.
Ask a New Yorker: Let’s discuss designer/client relationships and how you
perceive them.
Charles: Well an aggressive client is very difficult to work with because they
want it their way, their way or no way. So often is the case that this type of
client has no idea what it takes to install a very tailored interior. They start
to get in the way of progress and at that point the project can topple. When one
wors with a professional they need to make sure that they have trust in the designer
both on the business end and of course on the aesthetics. Successful projects
are those where there ahs been a collaboration between client and designer.
Ask a New Yorker: Then it’s a hindrance if a client has a strong sense of
style?
Charles: No, that’s terrific if they do have a sense of style. I always
say that it comes down to taste, level of taste. Whether you’re a designer,
a lay person, a client etc. whatever you do comes from your sense of taste. A
client with great taste will acknowledge and understand when great taste is presented
to them. If the client does not have great taste they need to be educated, prodded
along, pulled along and that becomes very tedious.
Ask a New Yorker: Have you ever grown a mustache?
Charles: Yes. A full beard when I was in my 20’s. When I did people thought
I was the actor doing Jesus Christ Superstar on Broadway.
Ask a New Yorker: What’s your favorite cocktail?
Charles: Martini.
Ask a New Yorker: Name your favorite interior for restaurant design.
Charles: My favorite interior for restaurant design is The Four Season in The
Seagram Building. Not because my family built it but because of the space itself,
the volume of space. I think that it is a great example of editing great interiors,
it is not what you put in the interior it’s what you leave out of the interior
that makes it successful. It’s a beautiful interior with the reflecting
pool, the height of the ceilings, the volume of space, the window treatments.
It’s a great dining experience.
Ask New Yorker: It’s my favorite room too. Phillip Johnson hit one out of
the park, especially with the shimmering drapes.
Charles: I’m what they call a frustrated architect, and that’s from
my family background. I come from a family of architects, engineers, and contractors.
I see space in totality. I don’t see a given space and then apply a design
to the space. I create design from the spaces and reconfigure the spaces. So I
take a very architectural approach, and that’s why my firm name says Architectural
Interior Design. It’s not that I’m an architect. Architectural is
an adjective for the type of design we do.
Ask a New Yorker: I bet you have fabulous view from your apartment?
Charles: When I got this apartment I had a wish list. On the wish list was a view
of the river. I do have a view of the river if I hang out on the fire escape far
enough and turn right I can see a sliver of the Hudson. Other than that I have
a city view. I’m looking at buildings that are part of the beauty of the
New York landscape. But I have a reprieve because I have a wonderful boathouse
in Connecticut that’s on a lake that was built in 1923, all stone. I also
have a hacienda type home in Arizona in Paradise Valley. So I get out of the city.
I love my homes.
Ask a New Yorker: Last question. What’s your favorite color?
Charles: As in interior designer I have to like all colors. I personally gravitate
to blues and greens myself. That’s personal. I can be very honest and straightforward.
My least favorite color is pink.
Ask a New Yorker: Thank you Charles Pavarini lll.
