Random bits of fabulous

Taken from the November issue of The World of Interiors.



The courtyard of Cranbrook's Saarinen House photographed by Richard Powers.




A covered patio in Tangier photographed by Roland Beaufre.



Recently, I read somewhere (and it wasn't over the rainbow) that there are people who actually believe that designers create a WOI look just to be published in those hallowed pages.

Mind boggling.



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Now playing: Toni Childs - Blind
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Clairee, you know I would rather walk on my lips than criticise anybody, but...

I just hate this.

Not because I think it an ill-executed mishmash, but because it is being proffered as an ideal for an interesting interior. To its inhabitants, it more than likely is. It is, if nothing else, highly personal. Many of the elements were chosen because they were seen to be anti-bourgeois. Unfortunately, these very elements are now part and parcel of the visual vocabulary of the nouveau bourgeois.

This is less about decorating and more about voyeurism. A voyeurism that will only spawn impersonal and derivative ill-executed mishmashes.


















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Now playing: The Human League - The Sound of the Crowd
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An elephant in the room?

Today the lovely Mrs. Blandings addressed the issue of taxidermy in interiors in her post, I'm Stuffed. Normally, a subject I prefer to stay away from. I know most don't get it, as was evident with the negative response Domino received for the Steven Sclaroff squirrel, which I not only respect, but am glad of the fact.

Taxidermy isn't for everyone, especially those who just regard it as a fad. Taxidermy, and the larger oeuvre of natural history, is for those who see or seek wonder. A wonder that is beyond ego and from a different age where curiosity and learning were encouraged.




Here, Victorian cases of birds, domed specimens, a crocodile and bracket fungus are used as sculpture.



A rare example of a Victorian penguin rug is used in lieu of a painting and the mounted horns are used to add depth to what would be an otherwise flat wall. The leopard cushions, a recycled 1930s coat, add life to a boring expanse of sand coloured upholstery.



In this scenario, Victorian cases are used in the same way pictures could be used. Ethographic items, skulls, and preserved specimens are used as sculpture.








Compare and contrast the two examples below. One is superb and of museum quality, while the other is merely good. As with everything, the finer examples are harder to find and undoubtedly are much more costly. Truth be told most find even the merely good to be more than they wish to spend. Hence, the proliferation of not only mediocre examples but also of 20th century examples masquerading as Victorian. The Internet is positively littered with them.





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Now playing: La Lupe - Puro Teatro (Pure Theater)
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Dear God,

I am not fourteen years old. I am not, and never have been, a good girl. Regardless, maybe you can still give me a sign letting me know what in the hell is happening around me.

It seems they are moving on from all things mid-century and will be embracing boho chic. Gag. Not because the style is repugnant, but because of how they, as is their wont, will bastardise and cheapen it.

In the latter part of the 20th Century only two people have been able to successfully capture the Bohemian spirit:




The first being the multi faceted Gloria Vanderbilt Cooper, as seen here photographed by Horst P Horst from Horst: Interiors. For more on Mrs Cooper and her New York apartment, visit An Aesthete's Lament.


The second is the transplanted Dutch designer Koos Van Den Akker.


Not from Celie

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Now playing: Shug Avery - Miss Celie's Blues (Sister)
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