Published July 23, 2021, 11:23 AM
Turning your house into a Ramon Antonio home
While our title does reference Philip Dick’s short stories and Giorgio Moroder’s song, it’s an apt allusion to the design philosophy of renowned architect, Ramon Antonio. For to reside in a Ramon Antonio home is to live in timeless, eclectic elegance. His masterful eclecticism is not just assimilating a variety of influences and looks, but it’s a thoughtful amalgamating of these inspirations to arrive at a singular expression of taste, function, design, modernity, and classicism all blended into a unique home.
Ramon Antonio
Call it wizardry, a magic touch, or what it truly is, a careful assembling of seemingly disparate elements into a unified look but Ramon Antonio has been creating these homes for decades now. And you wouldn’t be wrong to presume that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, as Ramon is the son of Pablo Antonio, a National Artist for Architecture.
THE artist in her studio in Aravaca, Madrid MANNY MIÑANA
Homage of Life, one of the paintings featured in the Retrospective at the MET MANNY MIÑANA
The Artist’s Studio in Makati MANNY MIÑANA
IT IS believed that we are a sum of our surroundings. Judging from portraits of her by other artists (including one by Fernando Amorsolo), Betsy Westendorp, one of the grandes dames of Philippine art, had been and continues to be a beautiful woman at the age of 93. She was surrounded by beautiful people and beautiful things, and in such a setting, nothing else but beauty is expected. The rarefied world that Ms. Westendorp lived in seemed to be a set path: to paint society portraits; then paint something beautiful; then see those hung on either the homes or the offices of the powerful she painted. Her works then serve as a salve, and an escape from this world, and an exercise in the purpose of beauty.
A Monster in our Midst: The Story of George Brignac
It was 1953, and George Brignac was fresh out of high school when he joined the regional chapter of the Christian Brothers.
He spent seven years with the Catholic order, which founded four well-known local schools: St. Paul’s in Covington, De La Salle and Christian Brothers in New Orleans, and Archbishop Rummel in Metairie. But, by 1960, the order had expelled him.
Brignac told some people it was for “reasons of health.” Another time, his superior in the order said Brignac found “obedience difficult.”
Years later, his twin, a priest named Horace L. “H.L.” Brignac, revealed the truth in a statement to police: George Brignac had been “too friendly with boys.”