Ludwig Bemelmans came to the California home of famed interior decorator Elsie de Wolfe, Lady Mendl, for cocktails. By the end of the night, he was firmly established as a member of the family: given a bedroom in their sumptuous house, invitations to the most outrageous parties in Hollywood, and the friendship of the larger-than-life woman known to her closest friends simply as ‘Mother’.

With hilarity and mischief, Bemelmans lifts the curtain on a bygone world of extravagance and eccentricity, where the parties are held in circus tents and populated by ravishing movie stars. To the One I Love the Best is a luminous painting of life’s oddities and a touching tribute to a fabulously funny woman.