home again; Hosting a real party chez vous for the first time ever.

Whether it happens in your 20s, 30s, or even 40s, there comes that seminal moment: You want to entertain at home.

But while the spirit may be willing, the process can be daunting-especially for perfectionists. Before you even begin to consider the scientific matter of boiling water or the nitty-gritty known as pots and pans, it can be reassuring to consider one's roots and family traditions. How were things done at home when you were growing up? Was the food comforting or challengingly clever cuisine? Were your people too formal or too informal? Which of their methods will you keep? Discard? How will you evolve your own entertaining style from theirs?

Aerin Lauder's grandmother Estee Lauder was one of the most commanding hostesses of the twentieth century, and in consideration of these entertaining questions (or, should I say, questions about entertaining?), Aerin has arrived at a personal style she calls "heritage with a twist." This is how she does it: traditional attention to good and easy food; beautiful flowers; and flattering lighting. Aerin mixes generations, children with parents, parents with grandparents, the young with the older.

When she entertains at her apartment in New York or her house on Long Island's East End, there is a short cocktail hour, about 30 to 40 minutes. "People work so hard nowadays, a long cocktail hour is unfair," she says. Then dinner is served buffet-style. A table is covered with a lavish offering of "comfort foods"-delicious curries, say, or Lebanese cuisine served in the black-and-white Viennese serving bowls she found in the gift shop at the Neue Galerie in New York, a museum her family supports. Guests can sit wherever they want, "arrive late and leave early, or come early and leave late, very relaxed." Aerin might seat dinner only if it provides a unifying factor for a group of friends going off to something afterward-a dance at a favorite museum, for instance, or a concert.

Recently, on behalf of her entire family, including aunt and uncle Evelyn and Leonard Lauder and cousin William Lauder, Aerin organized a dinner for the designer Tom Ford in the elegant ...