Funny article from the New York Times, also the subject of a post on Apartment Therapy (comments are especially interesting), about "over-propped homes".
“The self-consciously styled home has become almost commonplace, particularly in
cities like New York and Los Angeles where creative types congregate. “It’s not
just rich people now,” he said. “It’s all of us. ...Millions of Americans are now “amateur stylists — scrupulously
attending, as never before, to the details and meanings of the design and décor
of their homes, their clothes, their appliances, their meals, their hobbies, and
more.”
Is this true? With our new home, we are very focused on decorating and styling right now -it's always been a fun hobby for us, but of course, especially so these days. And I can totally see how the era of Martha Stewart/blogs/Pinterest/Instagram (recent tweet from the gratingly funny feed of The Honest Toddler: "Mom and I went to Anthropologie. It felt like we were walking into Instagram.") have brought this forward... I mean, these things have changed me, have changed us, have reworked our mindsets. The other day at the office I received an email saying "Surprise treats for everyone in the kitchen!" And truth be told I was very disappointed to find premade Pillsbury cookies that you buy already cut in a disposable baking tray. What? Someone incredibly nice and kind still thought about these, went to the store and bought them, baked them in their oven, then brought them to work for 85 people. But here I was, expecting... homemade Chai cardamom macarons?
What I want to say is that all these visual cues have upped the ante. And created "codes" that, apparently, can also quickly become clichés. I love Instagram, but apparently all the hipsters are "ugh...so over it now". M and I are totally design-conscious, but apparently not ahead of the curve enough, not individual enough in our style and/or not quick enough to abandon elements that have become signs of over-propping.
So. Collection of world globes? Check. We have 5 I think. They are mostly in the basement. The one is LP's bedroom comes from my childhood bedroom. The other ones come from M's family.
Vintage typewriter? Check. It was M's grandfather. It's always been there, for as long as I can remember.
Eames Eiffel dining chairs? Check. When we bought them several years ago they weren't available anywhere here, we had to have them shipped from Vancouver. Now they're ubiquitous, even in yogurt commercials.
So that's 3. According to the article, this means our house is over-propped. Ooops.
(On the other hand, our books are not arranged by color. Antlers kind of freak me out. I don't use Mason jars as glasses, although I think they look cool. And Le Creuset pots are not trendy to me, they're rather this supremely unhip thing my mom and every homemaker I knew had in their kitchens in the 70s in either unsightly brick red or unsightly avocado).
Where do you draw the line with over-propping? We have other collections, too, Coca-Cola things from the 40s and 50s, old radios, old juicers, old cameras (this one is also a cliché these days I believe). We love this stuff. It is meaningful to us. It's all either family heirlooms or things we trimphantly found during our many, many, mostly useless antiquing trips. They're just visually appealing objects, period. Usually much more so than the ones that are produced today.
The thing is, despite the obvious pitfall of going overboard, I'd still take "styled" over "unstyled" any day. Has "styled" automatically become synonymous with "fake"?
Whatever the mockery, the vintage typewriter is staying. :-)
6 comment(s):
If the things you have in your house have "roots" with you, because they were yours as a child, or in your family, you definitely get a pass.
If you've been collecting things for years and years because you love them, you also get a pass. (That's why I'll never surrender my blue-and-white china collection.)
If you copied a spread out of a design magazine or a catalogue by buying a bunch of made-in-China knockoffs, you're going directly to Design Jail, without passing go or collecting $200 worth of Anthropologie gift cards.
(I think you're safe.)
:-)
Since all of your props represent your personalities, experiences and past, they are not props, but part of your lives. Essentially, it sounds like your style/life is what the stylists are using props to recreate.
Interesting thoughts in this post and in the other articles linked to. It is weird to see things that you already have become very prevalent in design trends. For us, it's our globes and maps. My grandmother's mason jars too. But in reality, I guess most of our visitors don't read design blogs, so maybe they don't even know that these things are now quite popular? Dunno.
Anyhow, I like looking at design blogs, usually in order to re-think how I use and arrange the items we already own. But our stuff has a story and a reason we have it even if that reason is just that we like it, so I guess I just won't worry if anyone else thinks it is over-propped. :) Your stuff has a story and a reason too... But yes, interesting thoughts about how design-awareness and the internet influence the concept of authenticity....
Fascinating. I think Rubiatonta nailed it in terms of distinguishing authenticity from trying to fit in. I wouldn't have thought our home was overstyled (largely because it's so small we hardly have any room for anything that isn't also functional!) but I was still kind of relieved to see that the only 'overpropping' in our home is our Le Creuset collection. (And they're so useful in the kitchen! Why wouldn't everybody want a set?)
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