Upon his return to the United States in 1931, Seton Henry commissioned Pahlmann to decorate his eighteenth-century home, Pen Ryn, in Bensalem, Pennsylvania. Pahlmann’s extravagant design quickly garnered attention when the project was featured in Country Life magazine. Shortly after, he decorated a Manhattan apartment for Dorothy Paley, the first wife of William S. Paley, the founder of CBS. Although the ox-yoke headboard he designed for her bed attracted some criticism, the project helped to launch Pahlmann’s career.
