as favourite interior decorator to the stars of Hollywood, acted as design consultant to the White House and many of the world's leading resort hotels, written best-selling books on the art of home decoration and had your own newspaper column syndicated around the world (including Bermuda), what else is left? One predictable result is that you yourself become part of the gilded coterie that makes up today's international set -- and, sure enough, the world of famed designer Carleton Varney is to be featured in an upcoming segment of TV's Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.

But basking in the glow of past achievements has never been Mr. Varney's style and he has now launched another branch of his phenomenal career -- as a writer of fiction.

During a brief visit to Bermuda to launch Kiss the Hibiscus Goodnight with a book-signing session at The Bookmart, Carleton Varney, whose association with Bermuda goes back many years, paused long enough to talk about his literary debut.

His well-documented love of island life made the setting for his book inevitable, although he insists that the venue which he calls Jordralia is a "fictional'' tropical isle: "The title was taken from `Jord' for Jordan, and reflects the complexities of a country like that and the `ralia' refers to Australia and its remoteness from the rest of the world.'' Mr. Varney draws on his vast personal experience of life in exotic locales and his heroine is -- what else? -- a world-famous decorator. All the juicy ingredients required for today's best sellers are included: intrigue and murder all played out against a background of high-society sex in the sun.

He believes that most small islands have similar characteristics and he says that Jordralia reflects a mixture of these.

"The early settlers' descendants in most of these places end up thinking they are royal, so I've intermingled them with first and second generations and some of today's problems, like drugs, that affect everyone,'' he says.

Back in Bermuda for the first time in three years, Mr. Varney voiced concern over the island which he thinks is still "the prettiest of all the islands.

But when you see a major hotel like the Bermudiana left standing empty in the middle of Hamilton, it's very bad for Bermuda's image.'' He also felt that tourism was no longer promoted with the sure touch that it once enjoyed. "The mystique and romance doesn't seems quite the same as it was.'' And the man who has designed lavish interiors for what he refers to as "those concrete palaces on the sand'' firmly believes that there is no place for these over-sized structures in Bermuda.

"Wealthy people like to stay in small, personalised places -- you already have those -- and they're marvellous. Large hotels can never provide the same kind of individual attention,'' he said.

The world traveller (Japan last month, Istanbul next week) was also unimpressed with the new and "improved'' airport: "Stand here, don't stand there -- landing cards that ask your life history and then you have to pay a fee to get out again!'' Mr. Varney is certainly in a position to comment on Bermuda's image, as his list of commissions embrace most corners of the world. Hotels all over the US, London, Brussels, the Caribbean, Hawaii and Ireland, and cruise ships based in England, Chile and Singapore have all come under his designing scrutiny.

His interiors grace former President Jimmy Carter's Log House in Georgia, the Governor's Mansion in Charleston, the Presidential yacht, USS Sequoia and, most recently, Vice President Dan Quayle's official residence in Washington.

He was the colour consultant to the Carter Presidential Library in Atlanta and design consultant to the Carter White House.

As president of New York's leading design firm, Dorothy Draper, he has collected an impressive roster of clients who are superstars of the movies, entertainment, fashion and business world. He must also be one of the very few, or more probably, the only interior designer who founded his own design school that became part of a university -- that of Charleston in West Virginia.

While there is no sign yet that Carleton Varney intends to ease up on his endless round of creative innovation, he confessed that he would like to devote more time to writing in the future. His second volume, part of a three-book contract, will centre around another world he knows from the inside.

"The main character is a combination of Joan Crawford, Ethel Merman and Merle O'Brien,'' (all of whom have been `decorated' by Varney), he confided. He will evoke an age when "stars really were stars and products of a studio system that was devoted to creating legends''.

There are also plans for a book on Ireland, the country he has described as one of the few unspoilt places left in the world.

He was, perhaps, one of the few visitors to Bermuda in the last few weeks who was unfazed by the weather. With a philosophical shrug, he explained: "I'm not a bit surprised. Everywhere we've been lately where you expect the weather to be idyllic, it's been terrible. I'm not sure what's happening to the weather systems. But it's good to be back. Bermuda is still very beautiful.'' CARLETON VARNEY: Sex and intrigue in `Jordalia.'