NEW ORLEANS, LA.- Susan Sully, author of The Southern Cosmopolitan: Sophisticated Southern Style, will speak at the New Orleans Museum of Art on Sunday, April 26, at 2 p.m., with a book signing to follow.

The Southern Cosmopolitan examines styles shaping the South’s architecture and interior design today. A selection of luxurious houses from Charleston, Savannah, New Orleans, Atlanta, Natchez, and the Washington, D.C. area celebrates the sophisticated side of southern style with a mix of modern art, cherished antiques and exotic textiles. The lecture, which mirrors the inspiring book of the same title, is aimed at those who aspire to the height of southern style.

The facets of southern style that have long been admired by visitors from around the world are the starting point for The Southern Cosmopolitan: Sophisticated Southern Style (Rizzoli, May 2009), from the elegant Greek Revival double parlors of Charleston to the continental European decor of New Orleans Creole dwellings, not to mention the Italianate row houses of Savannah and the pristine Colonial Revival houses of Georgetown.

Author Susan Sully, renowned expert on southern architecture and antiques, approaches these buildings from a 21st-century perspective, delivering a fresh look at how the region’s tradition of worldly style is celebrated and updated by top southern architects, interior designers, collectors and homeowners.

A survey of the South’s most cosmopolitan homes—from a Savannah townhouse with an over-the-top Venetian interior to a sleek contemporary penthouse in Atlanta—The Southern Cosmopolitan features notable residences on the sophisticated side of southern style.

Whether exquisitely decorated with fine American antiques and European decorative objects or a bold mix of modern art, antiques and colorful textiles, these houses reveal southerners’ twin passions for the past and the present, and the global and the regional. Selected residences decorated by leading Southern tastemakers, including Norman Askins, Thomas Jayne, Amelia Handegan, Nancy Braithwaite, Hal Williamson and Ken Tate, are featured in lavish color photographs.

A writer and photographer, Sully’s work has appeared in magazines including Veranda, Town & Country and Southern Accents. Her other books include New Orleans Style: Past & Present, Charleston Style: Then and Now, Savannah Style: Mystery and Manners, Casa Florida: Spanish-Style Houses from Winter Park to Coral Gables and The Southern Cottage: From the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Florida Keys. Additional information can be found at www.southerncosmopolitan.com.