Martha Stewart's Cupcakes

Martha Stewart's Cupcakes is on bookshelves Tuesday! Be sure to pick up your copy and get baking!

Book description: Swirled and sprinkled, dipped and glazed, or otherwise fancifully decorated, cupcakes are the treats that make everyone smile, and are increasing in popularity. They have become the star attraction for special days like birthdays, showers and holidays, as well as perfect everyday treats. In Martha Stewart's Cupcakes, the editors of Martha Stewart Living magazine share 175 inspired cupcake recipes - with cakes, frostings, fillings, toppings and embellishments that can be mixed and matched to produce just the right cupcake for any occasion. Alongside traditional recipes like buttermilk cupcakes swirled with fluffy vanilla icing and devil's food cupcakes crowned with rich, dark chocolate frosting, there are also sweet surprises like peanut-butter-and-jelly cupcakes, dainty delights like almond-cherry tea cakes and festive showstoppers topped with marzipan ladybugs and candy clowns.


The 350-page book features cupcakes for every event and every season: celebrations (monogrammed heart cupcakes, perfect for an elegant wedding), birthdays (starfish cupcakes), holidays (ghoulish cupcakes for Halloween) and everyday cupcakes for casual entertaining or after-school fun (red-velvet cupcakes with cream-cheese frosting, caramel-filled chocolate cupcakes.)

In singular Martha Stewart style, the pages of the book are stunningly designed to be both useful and inspiring to the reader and home cook. Each recipe has a photograph of the completed confection and is paired with helpful how-to information, including step-by-step instructions, illustrative photographs demonstrating various procedures and creative ideas for packaging and presenting your cupcakes as gifts or at gatherings. Whether for any day or special days, the treats in Martha Stewart's Cupcakes are sure to delight! (It also makes a wonderful companion volume to Martha Stewart's Cookies.)

The Grounds at Skylands

Aside from several beds of lilies and a tucked-away cutting garden, Martha's insatiable lust for flowers is nowhere in evidence on the grounds at Skylands, her summer home on Mt. Desert Island in Seal Harbor, Maine. Moss, leafy vines, towering conifers and ferns create a verdant tapestry around the estate, leaving little room for fussy florals. And this is entirely by design.

Danish landscape architect Jens Jensen (1860 - 1951) designed the grounds at Skylands for the home's original owner, Edsel Ford, in 1926. Jensen, who moved to the United States in 1884, once worked for the West Park Commission in Chicago as a designer and gardener and was an avid promulgator of the Prairie school of thought, shared by the likes of Frank Lloyd Wright. He began to take on private commissions from America's burgeoning industrialists and soon became a well-known name in residential landscape architecutre.

The prairie philosophy is one of sparsity, clarity and unpretentious fixtures, meant to highlight nature's original plan with careful, well-considered tweaking to enhance and refine it - never to outshine it. Prairie landscape philosophy meant plenty of open space, meandering pathways through wooded patches, mass plantings of one particular garden specimen and the repeated use of stone to create foundational structure.

At Skylands, Jensen was at his best. The house, designed by Duncan Candler, is rustic Italian revival and stands in perfect contrast to the hilly landscape with its solid square shapes and long, rectilinear angles. The grounds are undulating with rocky outcrops, strategically highlighted and shaped to create a feeling of discovered natural beauty. Throughout the 63 acre property, which straddles Ox Hill, overlooking the harbor, pathways lead wanderers to hidden treasures like beautiful reflecting pools in the forests, a Georgian guest house, an old chapel, a council circle with a fireplace, a greenhouse and restful vistas in the woods where glimpses of the sea can be enjoyed in the sun-dappled shade.

The large terrace at Skylands can comfortably accommodate 300 people. An adjacent pergola is ideal for more intimate outdoor gatherings. Kiwi vines climb the pink granite of the home's facade in summertime.

This plan of the grounds at Skylands highlights some of the original features, including the many pathways, the multi-level terraces, a mountain meadow, kept intentionally bare of trees to allow sunlight through, a fountain and a counsil ring.

The driveway at Skylands is layered with crushed pink granite and lined with a feature known as Rockefeller teeth - those large stones in the background flanking the driveway. These rocks, officially called coping stones, were a feature of many carriage roads in Acadia National Park, which were a gift from Mt. Desert resident John D. Rockefeller. Cut roughly and spaced irregularly, the large slabs of granite create a rustic feel and act as a safety barrier.

The driveway curves graciously where it meets the front entrance of the house. In the center island, Jensen had originally intended mass plantings of asters. Today, the island is made up principally of fern species. The pink granite on the driveway is gathered up each winter, washed and stored for the following spring.

Another view of the driveway reveals the height of the fern island and the rocky wall that lines the entrance. The 1958 Edsel station wagon was a gift to Martha from her daughter, Alexis.

An outdoor table at Skylands is set beautifully with a sunken centerpiece of succulents. Jens Jensen had specified in his original plans that nearly all of the potted vegetation on the terraces should be tropical: palms, cycads and ferns. Martha has kept that tradition alive.

Deep in the woods surrounding the house, the moss and fern tradition continues.

Closer to home, Martha planted these antique cement troughs with varieties of moss from the adjacent forest.

Pathways on the property are carefully lined with fallen pine needles, which are brought in from the surrounding areas. This creates a visual cue for explorers. This reflecting pool, above, is located just outside the dining room window.

A pair of glazed terra cotta sphinxes, designed by Emile Muller, stand guard at the entrance to the living room.

This sculpture by Aristide Maillol, called La Riviere, rests on a luxuriant terrace that Martha converted into a moss garden.

In fall, the kiwi vines become a golden hue.

The landscape at Skylands is incredibly steep. The photograph above looks like an ancient Mayan ruin, but it is, in fact, the foundation wall of the Skylands residence. To minimize upkeep on these steep and sunken regions of the property, the grounds are heavily planted with ferns.

Martha encourages moss growth anywhere she can. It looks almost primordial on this granite staircase leading from the terrace above.

The McLean House

I love a good house tour - public or private. So, today, on my day off, I went with my beloved to see the McLean House on the grounds at Sunnybrook. The house has been newly decorated by 70 of Toronto's leading interior designers brought on board by the Junior League of Toronto to help benefit the Sunnybrook Hospital.

The rooms were spectacular! Sadly, photography was strictly forbidden. At every turn, down every corridor, was a pleasant looking woman wearing a light-blue apron who had been instructed to severely punish anyone who dared to take a photograph of any of the rooms. My plan to take dozens of pictures and post them here was thwarted. Below, however, you'll see some photographs of the grounds.

My favourite room was the main study on the ground floor, designed by Brian Gluckstein of Gluckstein Design Planning Inc. Dark wood panelling, a stunning bay window with a view to the gardens, sleek, modern furniture and extraordinary lighting gave the room the perfect blend of traditional and modern. The main feature was an enormous Japanese screen made of ebony that stretched across one of the walls, giving the room added depth. A roaring fireplace was kept minimally adorned.

"We wanted to create an environment that reflects the trends from 1929 when the residence was constructed and today, in 2009. The study's pine panelling, which reflects a mixture of classical architecture, was a popular material in these houses and remains a key design element in the house today," says Gluckstein.

The update was achieved through the furnishings, which were long, sleek and sturdy, many of them reminescent of the Art Deco period but updated with a modern pallette of greys, lavenders and creams.

Another favourite of ours was a room concept in the basement called "The Apartment of Lady X" by Wiklem Design. The room was certainly as naughty as the title suggests. Made to look like the classy suite of an empowered mistress, the room just exuded dark sensuality. And the room was dark: brick walls painted a clean black, a large, round, black marble table, a black desk outfitted in black leather, black lamps and ebony dressers. Lightness was brought into the room through mirrors and a recessed counter made of glass, lit from behind by clean white fluorescents. A sunken lounge area was arranged with sexy chaises and a vignette of white sculptures. The photography in the tight space was black and white and glamorous, featuring glorious portraits of Tina Turner, Mick Jagger and Jackie Onassis. The feeling is one of strength and sensuality - totally compelling!

Tomas and I were the only men in the place, which seemed to make us popular with the ladies. Many of them asked us our opinions about the rooms, what we liked, what we didn't. There were moments that we felt like the guides. It was a great way to spend a rainy afternoon. The house is open for tour until Saturday. For information visit jltshowhouse.com.

All visitors are given this beautiful catalog, which has a designer's sketch of each room and biographies of the designers.

History of the McLean House:

The McLean house dates back to 1928 when James Stanley McLean, President and Founder of Canada Packers, commissioned architects George Moorhouse and and King Associates to design a country retreat for his family on 50 rolling acres in Toronto, which he purchased for just over $90,000. The result was a house called Bay View (known today as McLean House, which is located on Bayview Avenue) one of Ontario's most splendid mansions. The fieldstone manor was embellished with Palladian windows, classic crown moldings, a grand circular staircase 12-foot ceilings and spaciouis rooms for grand entertaining. The acres of gardens were professionally landscaped by Gordon Culham, a landscape architect who worked in the tradition of formal English country style, with courtyards, manicured hedges and numerous urns filled to brimming with all manner of foliage and flowers.

The home remained the residence of the McLean family until 1966 when the widow of J.S. McLean moved to a smaller residence. The University of Toronto took over the property and it was converted into a clinical facility by Sunnybrook Hospital soon thereafter. In 1982 the house was renovated by the Junior League of Toronto and the Interior Designers of Ontario, who opened it to the public as a designers' showcase home. Following its transformation, the estate was opened as a venue for social and corporate events, with proceeds going to fund medical research for the hospital.

Photos of the Grounds:

A view of the stately McLean house from the courtyard at the back of the residence.

Note some of the intricate architectural details around the windows on the second floor.

At every turn outside the home was an urn of some sort, piled high with flowers.

The back terrace was an inviting space.

On the same terrace were several concrete urns. This one is home to an enormous staghorn fern.

We were both taken by the gnarled trunk of this mysterious tree.

A conservative formality rules the many gardens on the property: restricted palettes of white and green.

The entrance to the coach house was a lovely space to consider.

Beekman at Anthropologie

Being the Home department manager at Anthropologie in Toronto means immersing myself in fabulous products for the kitchen, the bedroom, the garden and the bathroom, including wonderfully luxurious soaps, from French-milled Mistral to Saipua to the much-loved Cucina. Now, much to my surprise and delight, we'll have the handmade Beekman soaps to stock our shelves with! It's already being advertised on the website, anthropologie.com. Brent Ridge and Josh Kilmer-Purcell are the creators and founders of the Beekman goats-milk soaps, which are handmade at their fabulous farm in Sharon Springs, New York. I'm fortunate enough to call these intrepid young farmers (featured in last month's Vanity Fair) friends of mine and I can't wait to visit their farm in the fall for an apple-picking extravaganza! In the meantime, I'll happily place their "After the Sun" soap bars on the rustic shelves of a found piece of furniture. Oh, I know just the spot!

Pioneer Nursery

I had the opportunity to visit my family in Ottawa this past weekend to celebrate my mother's birthday and to enjoy Canada's May long weekend, which is designed to celebrate Queen Victoria and her involvement as a founding member of Canada's confederation. One of the first things I did when I returned was to visit the Pioneer Nursery with my mom. Located just outside of the nation's capital in a town called Kemptville, the nursery is one of the best ones I've been to. The quality of the plants on offer, the knowledge of the staff and the beautiful variety available makes every visit there a treat. My mother had her eye on a few goodies for the garden, but we ended up loving just about everything we saw! Below are some highlights from the nursery and its greenhouses.
The entrance is welcoming. Inside the front building is a seed store and a section where houseplants are sold.

The expansive potting shed has a large assortment of ceramic, cement and iron vessels for outdoor plantings.

Potatoes, organically grown on site, are sold to visitors near the entrance.

A wide array of shrubs and small trees under the arbor.

There are eight large greenhouses where visitors can look at all kinds of potted plants and flowers for the garden.

The entrance to one of the greenhouses is a grand display of colour.

I loved the brilliant colours of this large fuschia flower. The petals almost look like intricately folded fabric.

Another gorgeous fuschia specimen.

These tuberous begonias were in full bloom, hanging above our heads. The stems were loaded with enormous flowers.

This deep pink tuberous begonia had already been sold to a lucky buyer.

This yellow begonia was my favourite of the day.

A pale pink fuschia that had yet to fully bloom.

This lemon tree had only one fruit, but it was large and looked ready to pick.

Fancy-leafed geraniums.

These alliums look like some kind of alien species silhouetted against the grey sky.

A brilliant spectrum of pansies.

They had many different varieties of heuchera.

These are flamingmound spirea - appropriately named.

I love the soft pallette of these salix integra 'Hakuro Nishiki.'

Beautiful flowering almonds.

A weeping crabapple tree. I had never heard of such a thing.

Martha to test online pay-per-view

Next week, Martha Stewart Living will begin testing a paid download model on its website, marthastewart.com, to allow consumers to view and listen to online segments of Martha Stewart Living Television, The Martha Stewart Show and Martha Stewart Living Radio not currently archived on the Web.

"It has to happen," Martha said at a panel discussion in New York City last week held by investment-banking firm DeSilva & Phillips. "We will see monetization on the Web."

Details about pricing for the offering have yet to be worked out, but it's an experiment for the company aimed at finding new ways to generate additional revenue online from archival video content. Its Web site will still largely remain a free, ad-supported venture.

The company will launch the test using a platform from iAmplify that allows publishers to set up complex business rules like creating subscriptions and bundling multiple products from individual pieces of audio and video. iAmplify runs branded pages within its customers' sites that facilitate online transactions and can also be used for additional advertising.

"All the focus for online video and audio has been on the ad model, but now the ad market is down in this economy and media companies are looking for ways to monetize and leverage their content through other means," said Murray Hidary, chief executive with iAmplify. "Certain online content should be free, but premium content - really valuable content where so much production and effort has been put into it - should be charged for."
-Wall Street Journal

The Lovely Lilac

When I was a child, each visit to my grandparents' house during the spring months involved at least a few hours playing in the long lilac hedge that grew on the eastern bank of her backyard. My brother and I would always end up amid the heady blooms and crawl up into the open spaces between the branches where we'd dream up imaginary worlds, new characters to inhabit and new stories to act out. Under the dangling purple blossoms, we'd lose ourselves in time and dreams.

In fact, lilacs hold a place of continued discussion - and some discord - in our family. My grandmother loved to grow them and had at least 15 trees in her backyard, plus one large one at the front. She would not, however, cut the blossoms for arrangements indoors, believing her mother's old superstition that having cut lilacs indoors brings bad luck. She never tempted fate and denied herself the beautiful display and sweet fragrance of cut lilacs on the living room coffee table. My father, a great lover of trees, resists the common lilacs the way he resists cologne. He finds their fragrance too heavy and dislikes their looks when they are not in bloom, which is most of the time: "Just a plain, weedy-looking tree," he concludes. While he may have a point about their Plain-Jane looks during most of the growing season, I cannot accept his assessment and I fully intend on having a lilac grove in my future yard.

Lilacs were first brought to North America by the Dutch and American settlers.

The lilac, a deciduous variety of shrub that can also grow to the height of a small tree, blooms throughout the spring, beginning in late April, throughout May and into the early days of June. The foliage of Syringa patula, the most common and most fragrant variety, turns a plum colour in fall. The beauty of lilacs is their hardiness and their easy care instructions. They are hardy from zones 2 to 7, meaning any lilac-lovers who have to suffer through long, cold winters will be rewarded by the arrival of those luscious blossoms come spring. (In fact, in order to bloom prolifically, the lilac requires several months of deep freeze, meaning those who live in tropical or sub-tropical regions have to go without these northern delights.) When the new season's sun begins to warm the earth, the lilac rejoices. They love full sun and rich, well-draining soil with neutral pH levels. The soil they grow in should be evenly moist and new seedlings will require deep watering for the first season of their lives in your garden.

Below are some photos of these virtuosities of spring.

In this bouquet, Martha's arranged a grouping of three different varieties to create a magenta spectrum.

Highland Park, above, in Rochester was developed by philanthropist Barry Ezwagner, who donated the 20-acre space to the county in 1888. Roughly ten years later the first lilacs began to bloom and the first annual Lilac Festival was held at the park, which is populated by dozens of fragrant lilac trees. Every year it attracts thousands of visitors, including one Martha Stewart. I imagine getting drunk on the perfume.... Martha planted an allee of lilac hedges leading to the tennis courts on her Bedford property. The varieties include both common and rare specimens, including several Korean examples.

The lavender shades of Martha's lilacs catch the brilliant springtime sun.