Kristen Stewart was asked about how she’s changed since the filming of Twilight, when she was a shy, sensitive young actor, and how she handles the nonstop coverage of her relationship with her costar Robert Pattinson.

WASHINGTON—It all started when Liz Levin’s daughter was learning to stand on her own. As the D.C. designer watched her toddler, Julia, seek support from the living-room furniture—a vintage coffee table made of glass and chrome next to a pair of antique armchairs upholstered in an expensive cream cotton—she realized things needed to change.

A crocodile. A polo player astride his horse and swinging his mallet. A pair of intertwined “Cs” and “Gs”. The similarly intertwined “LV”. The so-called swoosh. And so it goes, the icons that we have lusted after and assiduously appropriated into our lives—from the shirts we slip into and the bags that we carry around, to the shoes we step into and the fragrance we spray on.