Cecil Beaton noted the red-tile floors that were "carpetless but spotlessly clean." He also wrote of her in The Glass of Fashion: "Her effect on the taste of the last fifty years has been so enormous that the whole aesthetic of modern interior decoration, and many of the concepts of simplicity...generally acknowledged today, can be laid at her remarkable doorstep." Her tea table offered simple fare (no "vulgar" cakes), according to Beaton, who noted that her toast "was a work of art." Her niece rhapsodized, "Everything in Aunt Eugenia's house smelled so good." It was reported that the towels smelled of lavender, and that she washed her hair in rainwater. Errazuriz detested matched sets of furniture, knick-knacks and mementos. Ruthless on the subject of disorder – even down to the bureau drawers – she ordered: "Throw out and keep throwing out." This was an extension of her belief in the necessity of constant change: "A house that does not alter," she liked to say, "is a dead house." Errazuriz projected her purist mode into every corner of her life. "If the kitchen is not as well kept as the salon . . . you cannot have a beautiful house," she declared.