“When I’m with you I breathe different air,” Walter Einsel said to his bride-to-be, Naiad, as they walked down East Eighty-Sixth Street on their way to work. It was a beautiful June day in the first year of their life together, and for the 46 years that followed, they both breathed the rarified air of true love. But more than its longevity, it is the quality of their relationship that is so special and unique. They seemed, in fact, to raise the level of wedded life to an art form. Like the artists themselves, their work was elegant and engaging, inspiring and ingenious, witty and whimsical. The valentines and gifts they made for one another are both a testament to their mutual affection and to their sense of style and grace, and are among the many ways this extraordinary couple nurtured, affirmed, and celebrated their love and life together.

It all started even before they met, with a mutual admiration of one another’s work. Naiad, a graduate of Pratt Institute, was working as an art director for the promotion department of CBS. Walter, a graduate of Parsons School of Design, held the same position at NBC. They were only twenty-five years old, but had already established individual reputations in the commercial art world. They met when Walter applied for a better job at CBS where Naiad was working. A mutual friend called her into his office to look over Walter’s portfolio as a plot to have them meet. Because of his German-sounding name, she had pictured him as mustached and middle-aged, with a thick accent, but to her delight, he was young, slim and handsome right down to the Cary Grant cleft in his chin. She was dazed. And the pages of his portfolio looked blank to her, although she was able to make pleasant comments about their quality. Walter, in turn, was smitten with her dark, sultry beauty. After a few moments of silence, he asked her, “Would you like to see ‘La Traviata’ in a nutshell?” and produced from his pocket a hinged walnut, which opened to reveal tiny colored paper characters representing the figures in the opera. She thought he was a kook. Albeit a cute one.

Naiad returned to her office and spent the rest of the day in a trance. Walter would later say about this meeting, “I didn’t get the job, but I got the girl.”

Their next meeting was also arranged by that same mutual friend. It was at Hurley’s bar, a neighborhood “happy hour” watering hole frequented by NBC staff. They spent the evening over glasses of beer talking and laughing, their elbows pulling on the red checkered tablecloth in eagerness to be closer and learn more about one another. After that, they were inseparable.

Their first official date was to be a picnic at a beach in Connecticut. Naiad had purchased a Willys Jeepster a few months before they met and had resolutely refused to let anyone else drive it. On that occasion, however, as they approached her precious car brimming with the antique baskets that contained their movable feast, Walter said, “I’ll drive, OK?” As she willingly dropped the keys into his outstretched hand, she realized that if she could trust him with her car, she could put her life in his hands, too.

They had similar tastes in everything from poetry to politics. Even their apartments were decorated alike, with antique trade signs, old clocks and oak furnishings. She had one taupe wall and three white walls; he had three taupe and one white. They also worked in similar styles, so a working partnership, namely marriage, was the obvious next step. They moved into a brownstone on East 61st Street, and combined their possessions, which complemented each other as much as their personalities did. They began to work closely together, too; talking out ideas for upcoming jobs and even filling in for one another if one became blocked or overly busy. The client never knew if Naiad had finished Walter’s job, or vice versa.

As their reputation and popularity grew, they became even more busy and successful, creating illustrations for most of the major magazines, record album covers, book jackets, package designs, movie posters, TV commercials and commemorative stamps for the US Postal Service. They wrote and illustrated several children’s books. Other clients included Macy’s, The New York Times, Gilbey’s, and Merrill Lynch (the ubiquitous bull logo is Walter’s design). Naiad’s designs have appeared on Fieldcrest towels, Dansk dishes, and she designed the award-winning bicentennial quilt for the Westport Historical Society. In 1979 they were commissioned to design the AT&T “Age of Information” display at Epcot Center. Their work has been exhibited at the Society of Illustrators (where both Naiad and Walter are members of the Hall of Fame), The Museum of Contemporary Crafts, The Art Directors Club, Graphis and other design publications, as well as private collections.

The Victorian farmhouse they moved into in 1965, with their daughters Leslie and Hilary, was an ideal setting for their artwork. With gleaming wide-planked floors, and filled with country antiques, oak tables, a roll-top desk, brass beds, copper molds, weather vanes, apothecary jars, antique trade signs, and numerous plants alongside their original artwork, the house was an unforgettably warm and inviting place.

Walter died in 1998, and Naiad in 2016, leaving a remarkable artistic and human legacy. Through this site, we hope to offer a glimpse of the magic and joy they shared; to delight and inspire you, as if you were sitting on the screened-in porch of that 1850s Victorian. Though the house has changed hands, the magic and joy of this extraordinary love endures. 

(by Linda Clifford, adapted by Lisa Bastoni, from the introduction to “Art From the Heart: a collection of unique Valentines designed by Naiad and Walter Einsel,” XLibris, 2008.)