ROBERT CARRIER, INTERNATIONAL COOKBOOK AUTHOR AND HOTELIER AND RESTAURATEUR EXTRAORDINAIRE:
“As an old friend of Edward Carter, I happily answer the obvious question—Who is he? Known as “Ted,” American and fifty-something, he’s an international socialite and businessman who paused for a moment in his busy career and “retired” to The Point, his wilderness estate on Upper Saranac Lake, New York in the spring of ‘79.

He invited me to a houseparty and I lightheartedly said, “Why don’t you take paying guests?” That was the beginning. Carter picked up on the idea and for the next seven years, he ran one continuous brilliantly choreographed houseparty 365 days a year, personally hosting every lunch and dinner.

So from my off-hand suggestion, The Point became one of the most famous special hotels in the world, Ted was featured in nearly every major magazine including a Forbes cover story and was elected as International Delegate for the United States, Bermuda, Mexico, and the Caribbean for Relais et Châteaux! His responsibilities? to seek out and vet those establishments aspiring to belong to this august association of the world’s finest hotels and restaurants.

Ted made his point with The Point, sold it and now his days are filled with new discoveries around the world. Ted’s spent most of his life traveling and as one of the most particular people I know, he sees just what makes a hotel extra special or a restaurant simply wonderful.” Robert Carrier

BRITISH VOGUE: “Carter’s a suave, Europeanised American.”

FORBES:

Featured in the cover story about three talented entrepreneurs, Carter was highlighted as being “wildly successful” with “guts, imagination and ability.”

THE 300 BEST HOTELS IN THE WORLD: The Point is not a hotel, heaven forbid, and not even a guest house since the only guests there are people whom the owner, Ted Carter, actually likes. It’s really like being invited to a houseparty by a man who insists on keeping Armangnac in his boathouse and Vuitton suitcases in the closets. The Point is absolutely, but absolutely, lovely, a place in which everything you see is total perfection of taste with priceless pieces scattered about in glorious extravagance...and the whole place sparkles with wit and charm.”

BRITISH TOURIST AUTHORITY:
“Dear Ted,
I just finished perusing your latest “Letters From Abroad,” and felt I should drop you a note to tell you how much I enjoy them. You really do have a knack for the written word and you have obviously hit upon a formula that works. It’s a little like getting a letter from a rich uncle and vicariously sharing his travels, adventures, friends and experiences. What’s more, the style is breezy and sophisticated so it’s fun to read. I really don’t know another newsletter like it.
Regards, Bedford (Pace)”

CYBERTRAVELER:
A Hotel Site With Vision
One of the great joys of surfing the Internet is blindly entering a word you might think is a web site address. Of course, half the time you'll end up at a porn site. Sometimes, though, you'll stumble onto amazing gems like TravelVision.

TravelVision has quirky, intensely personal, funny, insightful and profusely illustrated reviews of about 1,800 hotels and resorts around the world. Some reviews are outdated, and some rave about once-fabulous places that have gone to seed, but most are dead on target and excellent guideposts for sophisticated travelers.

Weirdest of all, however, is the fact that TravelVision is also the personal web site of Edward (Ted) Carter, international bon vivant and business wiz who these days just happens to be editor-in-chief of bizTraveler.

He's never mentioned TravelVision around here, though, and I think I know why. If you go to the "Carter on Carter" feature of TravelVision, you'll come across Carter's putative bio. In fact, however, it's an illustrated diary of how business travel used to be: elegant, fun, a lifestyle worth pursuing. For those of us children of deregulation who have never experienced business travel as anything but a dreary chore, reading about how life on the road used to be is really depressing.

Joe Brancatelli, biztravelife.com

JAMES MYHRE (Carter's partner at The Point):

San Francisco, July 4, 1995

When Edward Carter first began what was then known as his “Letters from Abroad” back in the Docklands of London in 1987, he had unwittingly entered what was to become for him a year-long identity crisis.

At first, the notion seemed quite innocent. Having “retired” from international business for the third time, Ted found it quite natural to combine his life-long passion for travel with his instinctual knack for entrepreneurship. The idea of a series of “travel correspondences” certainly seemed like the perfect sideline for Ted’s retirement; something that he could almost do with his eyes shut.

Yet when the first issue of “Letters from Abroad” was released to a tiny audience of friends, family, and associates, Ted was wracked with anxiety. Then and for the next eleven issues, he asked himself, “Why would anyone listen to me?”

Mind you, when Ted first began to rifle through a handful of sketchy notes and dog-eared maps, I doubt he gave a moment’s thought to whom his audience was. Certainly much of his motivation was egoistic —Ted is rarely characterized by his reserve — but through it emerged “letters” that were, by turns, insightful and idiosyncratic, witty and wicked. “Letters from Abroad” developed a true sense of personality, a perspective that spoke more of impressions than of standards. We as readers, could vicariously share Ted’s vision of the world and, though we sometimes disagreed, we always understood from where he was coming.

By the second year, Ted became more comfortable with his “Letters,” constantly refining them to his own aesthetic ideal. He changed its name to “Travels.” (“Letters from Abroad,” he felt, sounded too “twee.” “TRAVELS,” like him, was more direct, solid, to-the-point). But still, even as praise and subscriptions soared, he never really knew how to respond to the question, “Why you?” Rare and utter silence would ensue.

I met Ted fifteen years ago when he bought “Wonundra,” a tired Rockefeller estate in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. Soon after, he would embark on the second of his early retirements, this time from a prospering financial business in London, to dedicating himself to rediscovering his roots in the wilds of upstate New York. “Wonundra” was soon renamed “The Point” and as a rational sideline to his retirement, he decided to take in paying guests. After all, Ted would declare, it’s no fun having an empty house. The Point became a huge success and the idea of “retirement” was again something more sought than enjoyed.

I watched Ted over the course of seven years “finessing” The Point, molding it almost invisibly to his mind’s ideal. For example, I would often cajole him about the way he would walk to a tree, mark an errant branch for removal, walk back to the house to check the view from several rooms, and then (after doing this for two or ten times), chop it off. As the years passed, however, no one could ignore how, as if by magic, vistas were opened; how one could feel cradled by the coniferous boughs yet sense an air of expansiveness uncharacteristic to the tangled Adirondacks.

I watched as The Point slowly took on Ted’s personality in minute detail — his brashness and his razor-sharp wit, his understanding of time and place, his love of both theatrics and home-spun simplicity. Maybe The Point wasn’t perfect (many would argue with me) but it was “right.” It had so strong an identity that few guests ever felt they were in an hotel.

Now interactive and on-line, “Travels” has come-of-age. Ted has grown comfortably into the role of its founder, no longer shying from his reputation as a unique travel connoisseur. Nowadays, however, he tends to glide over the tales of multi-national corporations, book-thick passports, the millions that he has earned and spent, and the famous and infamous who have helped define his sense of style and appreciation of the absurd. “Travels”, indeed, speaks for itself.

But if this is your first introduction to Ted, you still might ask, “Why him?” Is it enough to say that he’s one of the most fascinating, erudite, and insightful men I’ve ever met? Forget his “qualifications” which, believe me, are impeccable. Simply proceed and enjoy — I think you’ll know “why” in no time.

James Myhre