Things for your garden, from right to left: Roman column, menacing bird of prey statue fit for a military dictator, mass-produced standing stone with Chinese inscription, birdbath/fountain with peeing cupid and his parents, cartoon meteorite.

Acutally, this is neither a meteorite nor a fake. It’s a real, naturally occurring rock of some kind. Must be volcanic but I have no idea what it is. Does anyone?. It rusts so it must have iron in it, and it’s hard. If I had the room and the money, I’d buy it.

This closet/dressing room is part of a townhouse on NYC’s West Side. The house was decorated by interior designer Samuel Botero in a mad eclectic mix of all possible ornate styles, including Egyptian Revival and Biedermeier and art deco, at his clients’ request. The rest of the place is very dark velvet/chairs with paws/animal print/excess, but then suddenly in the middle of it all there’s this bright fantastical room which actually transcends the general madness of the house and achieves something mythic. I could do without the black cloverleaf casket thing with the ribbon-motif and weird silhouettes, which Botero designed himself, though I suppose it would come in handy for conducting seances while also storing hatboxes or maybe the skeletal remains of small children. But Botero gets credit for extreme daring and for the genius use of emerald green and cream, and all joking aside I sincerely admire the way he just let his imagination run wild, if not amok. This is the sort of room that demands that you re-decorate yourself to match. You’ll need an entirely new period wardrobe, an upgrade from monomania to megalomania, and whatever exotic pet affectation strikes your fancy – an emerald green parrot maybe, or a talking owl. Or an albino cheetah, why not. And a leprechaun. They love hats. Photo by Phillip H. Ennis, via the ever strange AD.