Essentially Lilly: A Guide to Colorful Entertaining

For more than 40 years, designer Lilly Pulitzer has lead the charge in pretty, preppy chic--a resort look long-worshipped by prim teens and stylish ladies alike. While the signature pink-and-lime-green floral frocks are what she's famous for, Pulitzer has also become known over the decades as the consummate hostess, now celebrated in her book Essentially Lilly: A Guide to Colorful Entertaining. Like most people with great style who aren't shy about showing it, Pulitzer put her personal stamp of informal elegance on all her gatherings, turning her home in Palm Beach back in the sixties (and beyond) into a "famously unstuffy" stomping ground for the resort town's movers and shakers. Unlike other entertaining tomes, Essentially Lilly doesn't go the route of practical party planning. Instead, Pulitzer's book unfolds like a diary of sorts, a scrapbook of her life chronicling inspirations, favorite moments, and events. Chapters are broken down into three sections reflective of the designer's lively aesthetic ("Mellow Yellow Mornings," "Think Pink Afternoons," "True Blue Evenings"), and ideas come by way of Pulitzer's Palm Beach passions--sunrise sails to the Bahamas, golf and tennis, weddings in her jungle slat house, and treasure hunting, among other things. In lieu of countless recipes (though there are a few good ones), Pulitzer extends a broader one--a more personal formula for a fun life, and in this, Essentially Lilly is dynamic and sincere. --Christene Barberich