When I invite colleagues home, the line between private and public life further blurs. West Coast editor and frequent contributor Brian Coleman comes to mind; ironically, he has softened my masculine house with his gifts of vintage textiles.

My teenage son came back from a school trip last June announcing that he wanted to be a blacksmith. Astonished by the plasticity of hot iron, Peter had made a wall hook. It is sculptural and quite nice.

I’m trying to remember which house style was symbolic of health and happiness, back when I was growing up. I think it was the Dutch Colonial. No matter whether the house was ancient, post-Victorian, or newly minted, nothing said “American family home” like a gambrel roof.

In this photo, I was trying to decide how to finish my bedroom, which had been a home office in prior years. The paint chips and fabric samples had been pinned to the walls for quite some time. I’d bought a flat-weave rug in a Morris design, you see, colored red and green.

This is about dinnertime in an old house. I am writing this during summer, and I am home. Downstairs my boys are watching TV after dinner, lolling about in damp bathing trunks, having run and swum and skate-boarded and walked the dog. I am finishing up this issue before a family vacation in California. We’re leaving in four days.

How can a group of persons, in all their infinite differences, passions, and imperfections, create a perfect place? They cannot, at least not for long. But isn’t it wonderful how many have tried?

Gorgeous lighting reminds me that the artists and craftspeople whose work fills this magazine often inspire awe in me—and joy.