A Loving Table: Creating Memorable Gatherings

Inspiring tables and entertaining styles of 34 tastemakers in their regions or society at large show how they keep traditions passed down from mothers and grandmothers alive in their families.

Thirty style-setting women pay tribute to how their mothers and grandmothers have influenced their own styles of entertaining at home. Whether they proudly incorporate recipes passed down from a grandmother’s collection or follow a mother’s lessons for making guests feel comfortable, it is clear that family role models have had a strong influence. Blending inherited dinnerware or decorative pieces in their modern tables is also big in the way women embrace their heritage for entertaining. From formal to casual occasions, city to country, and grand to intimate, indoor and outdoor tables beautifully designed tell a story about how these women host guests at their tables. Each style maker shares tips and lessons in entertaining that she learned from the women in her life.

Tip boxes from each generation will help the readers reproduce the ideas and perpetuate their own familial traditions.

Kimberly Schlegel Whitman has developed her extraordinary talent for hosting parties into an entrepreneurial empire, from her luxury event rental business (sold in 2006) to a line of monogrammable linens and party napkins (sold in 2018). She is the author of eight books on entertaining, her most recent being Parties Around a Punch Bowl and Monnograms for the Home. She designed a specialty line of summer clothing for Dillard’s in 2021 and 2022. Kimberly lives in Dallas.

Shelley Johnstone Paschke, owner of her eponymous design firm, has been nationally recognized for her elegant European-influenced Interiors with a fresh modern twist. Her work has been featured in House Beautiful, Traditional Home, Chicago Magazine, Luxe, The New York Times, ArchDigest.com, Veranda.com, and Tory Daily. In addition, she has been named to the Luxe “Gold” List multiple times and recognized as a “Next Wave” interior designer by House Beautiful. Shelley and her team have worked on projects from Rhode Island to Florida, London, Dallas, and Chicago. Shelley lives in Lake Forest, Illinois.