The first time I walked into the SoHo loft of the decorator Thomas Jayne and his partner, Rick Ellis, I was furious. Jayne, after all, was the man who had encouraged me to “pare down” and “think modern.” And now here was his own space, cluttered with busts and books (more than 5,000 of them), antlers and skulls, bugs (dead ones) and a stuffed bat flying from the ceiling. There were also a pair of white sphinxes, piles of Old Paris porcelain and Chinese vases, not to mention a reliquary containing a piece of the “true cross.” And except for the two mid-century bedside tables and the Jean Prouvé chairs in the dining room, much of the furniture is from the early part of the 19 th century.