Friday, September 11, 2015

A dog's life


A surprising (to me) forty seven days ago, I wrote "back soon" at the head of the blog and here I am at the end of summer, after a four-week bout of bronchitis and an outbreak of shingles that I, at first, thought were multiple spider bites from walking Barny in the trees surrounding the duckpond. There's been a lot of time to give thought to … well, just stuff like a new bathroom, redecorating the living room, sending the carpet to be cleaned of whippet tracks, life, love and happiness, and what seems to be the senescence of blogging and the success of its peregrinating and bewitching kin, Instagram.


As I coughed my way through the awful humidity and the noise of construction seemingly as endemic and unceasing as that of insects and traffic, Barny chomped on dried duck poop (not eaten in this family, as I reminded him, for generations), and held relentlessly, if variably, to his food-in-food-out regime every couple of hours, drivers halted for ducks at crossings, some lowering their windows to remark "what a pretty pup," or "what kind of dog is that?" joggers ran, friends died or got sick, dogs and their owners said hello, and, one day, the heron, often to be seen at the pond, took magnificent flight, circled and landed high atop the trees over the crossroads.


Out of sorts and worn out during those weeks, I had plenty of time to read and it quickly became clear I was wasting my time with most interior decorating blogs – unless, that is, I was looking for the same sort of information available to me more quickly and interestingly elsewhere. Magazines advertorial does a better job than ever a blog could, whatever the aspirations the blogger may have. 

Whereas the overriding tenor of interior design blogland is breathlessly sycophantic, in my opinion, the aesthetic is even worse. Who any longer has any taste other than to endorse  a celebrity "design" collaboration? Frankly, if I were to judge by many of the blogs I read, I would say that fashion plays an exclusionary role and conformity rules the day. Some of us rue the day because the implications of this for design, decoration and the environment are appalling.  

I'm so bored with what is happening in American interior decoration as portrayed in the magazines and decorator monographs. As I've said before, it is always the same two variations on themes –  traditional and modern – with one swinging in color between allowed and not allowed and the other never budging from neutrals with a primary color and black.

We do not own any mid-century-modern furniture except a Paul Dunbar bench in the hall and, given the ridiculous prices ($65,000 to-the-trade for a high-backed winged-chair, 1939), its fashionability and copious quantity, it is unlikely we shall have any more of it. It is not just mid-century-modern's popularity that puts me off it – so contrary I'm not – but the rage for it makes me think of a bubble, given that there must have been so much of it manufactured.

Haute couture has its original designers but American (perhaps also European) interior decoration design has been usurped by salesmen and the auction houses. I am of the opinion that whatever the PR people might like us to believe haute décoration, or the knowledge of what residential interior design actually is, has been reduced to nothing more than the marketing of personalities and their wares. Never mind the quality, feel the width.

With all that in mind, I'm turning for a while to Europe to see what is going on there. I have a feeling, and it might be nothing more than bias, that the situation there is a little more loose, more original, less hidebound. As I say, I might be biased but, either way, I could learn a lot – I'm so over being bored.

I've already mentioned architect/interior designer Chester Jones five times and he remains my favorite of the designers working in Britain today, thus I do not intend to exclude him in future. Geoffrey Bennison, though long-dead, is also a firm favorite and his work remains utterly up-to-date and is for all to see in Gillian Newberry's excellent book Geoffrey Bennison: Master Decorator (in its second printing). The work of Mlinaric Henry & Zervudachi is pretty terrific as is the work of Tino Zervudachi in his own right. Jean-Louis Denoit, Alberto Pinto, Christian Liagre come to mind but they are all the subject of monographs – it may be that I'm limited to those books alone. We'll see.


You may wonder why these other photographs are here. The display of blue-and-white is composed of gifts: the tulip pot from employees, the rest from family. Placed on our drinks table, for a while the ensemble cheered the dining room until it became clear Barny (Sleeping Beauty, below), started taking notice and it had to be cleared away. The point of it really is to remind me to write about one day about accessories, memorably compared by one blogger/decorator to the finishing touches to an outfit – in her case an exhortation to buy her trinkets – but, in my opinion, accessories are simply those things which have some meaning to one's life and are not there to glamorize an empty space. But, that is for another day – maybe next time.


The photograph of Barnaby Warboys asleep against my leg as I rest my back on the sofa is about the way a four-month-old whippet pup erupted into my life our lives bringing a complete change. I've had to send the living-room carpet to be washed and stored; the floor is littered with his toys; whoever said whippets don't shed, lied, because the floor … OMG, the floor; I cover the sofa with an old quilt that matches nothing else; Barny's hand-crocheted acrylic yellow-and-white afghan lies in a sunny spot waiting for him to rearrange and snooze on it; we take off our shoes, Barny triumphantly runs with one daring us to come and get it; odd socks are usually found in his bed; my almost-as-expensive-as-my-replacement-MacBook-Air distance glasses made a lovely crunching sound when they were the only thing he found to chew when teething (oh, did I mention the watering can spout?); the maid is staying a lot longer (she'll be coming daily if I get my way. None of this matters for, in the loving, funny, nibbling, happy, bellyrub-loving dog's life that I lead, I would not have it any other way. A dog's life, indeed.


This photograph and accessories are the subject of the next post – unless the creek rises, that is.

21 comments:

  1. I was married in 1956 so I can well remember when mid-century modern furniture was simply new furniture. My husband's parents gave us a sleek Danish modern dining room set for our wedding present. It was expensive and fashionable and well, we hated it. Our dining room looked just like the dining rooms of all of our friends. We began collecting antique furniture, which suited our tastes better, but our non-conformity to trends made us a curiosity. Speaking of conformity, nearly everyone in those days shunned anything antique in favor of the new. It surprises me when I see some of my grandchildren collecting furniture I loathed when it was new. They don't seem to know why they like it, other than knowing the blogs they read feature pictures of rooms they try to recreate. It is a shame, really, because I see such lovely antiques(in the true sense of the term) of high quality going for such modest sums at auction. I have one grandson who takes after me and recently acquired at auction a stunning 18th century Dutch desk with gorgeous proportions and inlay for a few hundred dollars. His sister collects mid-century modern and Eric Ravilious pottery. Just one plate costs more than that lovely Dutch desk. Blog after blog ape a similar look: heaps of Suzani pillows and some Eric Ravilious bits and bobs, say, then everyone is mad for them. After a while it all looks derivative and quite boring.
    You are a man after my own heart, dear.
    Your new puppy is darling.
    Mary

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    1. Hello, Mary and thank you. You are right – "all looks derivative and quite boring." It's the self-congratulatory mediocrity of it all that is the most irritating. The event in Los Angeles a few months ago, Legends on La Cienega was, I think, a low point in insincere praise of the humdrum.

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  2. I think what is lacking from so much of the other blogs (a dying 'artform' if it ever was one) is meaning. As you say about the blogger (I think I know whom you are referencing) selling her trinkets -they are not merely to 'take up space'.....these trinkets shouldn't be bought but found and collected over time. One isn't decorating a storefront but creating a home.
    Anyway - instagram has been my fun discovery as well this past 6 months and probably why my blog only gets attention every 2 weeks or so. Instagram is the new blogging I think.
    I'll be in Atlanta (Finally) in November - I'll email you. I may be coming along or with my friend Michael Hampton.

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    1. I'd enjoy meeting you when you are in ATL. Haven't seen "The Blue One" in person lately either. Certainly not since he's been getting dosed with doggie love. Instagram is really good for me.

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    2. Stefan, as is usually the case, you and I agree. I feel that those of us who continue to blog should do so with a tad of pride and a glass of bourbon perhaps. Instagram is terrific but I find I can get lost going from one hashtag to another until there's a whippet pup chewing my ankle in desperation for a meal. As to your visit – we haven't any trips planned so am looking forward to seeing you.

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  3. I think you needed Barny to keep you younger. Love reading about his adventures. It is amazing how new love makes us look at all things anew. What an amazing gift!

    I fear blogging is dying. I shall miss it. Instagram seems, well, so instant. And mid-century modern: that was my mother's choice. I always hated it, especially when I realized that at 65, it was a term that could be applied to me!

    My husband retires in December and his employer gave him a trip of choice from the university's travel schedule. We chose London. We'll be there for 11 days and then on our own to Scotland. My maiden name is Houston and I have to drop by and see where it all started. I agree that this round the world in sync decorating just sucks the life out me. But, then, Houstons have always been an eccentric lot.

    ps Loved the picture of you and your "much younger" professor. Such dear affection between you two.

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    1. home before dark, thank you. I began to answer you this morning but an insistent nip on my toes informed me Barny had no intention allowing me free time and now we've had our morning drive which he slept through I'm receiving conciliatory licks around the ankles. Such is my life.

      I wonder if blogging might become an early 21st-century form of that old love of many of us – the 18th- and19th-century diaries but instantly published and for free. I'm going to continue as long as I may and who knows even whippets may get a say in the matter.

      Though I would find London too tiring to live in again I do what it has become culturally. The biggest shock was the two-hour limitation to a restaurant reservation which I found both mean and infuriatingly "nannyish." But the National Portrait Gallery is a gem and the National just next door … 11 days is an enviable amount of time to have there. I like to use buses when I don't use taxis as there is more to see and the claustrophobia of the tube is killing. Scotland, as you know, is where Rory is from and it's a place we both have great affection for. The Isle of Sky, if you've never been, is worth the trip especially in the rain. (Only a Brit ex- or not could say that!)

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  4. well the word vignette was not do common a term as it is now. That's for another time I agree BC that could be a blog of its own. I think most mean well...
    I like Instagram I really do but I really think that it can't replace good writing/blogging. There's a slot for anything and for some they can overlap but I like meatiness and IG is too much like a cocktail party where there are lots of nibbles but I never leave feeling the same as a slap up dish even if it's a fry up cafe.

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    1. Coulda shoulda woulda, thank you and my apologies for the late reply.

      I find Instagram riveting and irritating in its brevity but it can be very clever. I used it a lot this summer as you know when things were not so good and it gave me a very pleasurable focus. There's nowt wrong with a good old caff fry-up and I agree with your point – what I wrote above about some blogs becoming online literary diaries (maybe).

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  5. I'm so sorry to hear you've been so unwell, although the new pup is obviously a welcome distraction (despite the shedding!). I agree with you about Interior Design/ Decoration… I'm very tired of mid Century modern. It's become so formulaic to use it, and when large furniture retailers like West Elm start producing brand new mid century rip offs, it's obvious everyone is starting to look the same.
    I do think there is a homogeny in design at the moment though, perhaps brought about through mass saturation of design trends via the Internet. We have it here in Australia - there is a look, and I find it frustrating. No one under the age of 60 are buying antiques (especially the "brown furniture"). Good to purchase in the antique sale rooms, but a little sad at the same time.
    Chester Jones is a brilliant designer, and I've always loved the work of John Stefanidis, probably my favourite of the great English decorators. He has a wonderful lightness of touch. Hope your health continues to improve, and your upcoming post on accessories sounds wonderful.

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    1. Heidi, thank you for your kind words and wishes. The pup, now six months old and quite large, is a wonderful, intelligent, lovingly playful handful I cannot imagine life without. Fashion, with it's power to affect the gullibility of people to the point of believing that a uniform is individuality, is the culprit. What happens in the garment industry now happens in decorating and almost as rapidly.

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  6. Back to say I just read this http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/t-magazine/james-ivory-house.html and thought it a lively antidote to sameness.

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    1. home before dark, thank you. I hadn't seen it and you're right about it being an antidote to sameness (sadness, too, I should think.)

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  7. Love that heron, love your blue and white and the frog and especially love the Barny one. I no longer read anyone else's blog - I got bored with all the same old same old and the selling out to advertisers. I love the immediacy of Instagram, blink and the world passes by without you. Glad to hear you're feeling better, keep writing and a big thankyou for mentioning the book.

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    1. gilliannewberry, thank you. I'm finally getting around to answering – whippets, it seems, don't like their family members to be too long away from them or attention to wander away. I love Instagram too and this summer found it a way of keeping up when I was too preoccupied to even think let alone write. I discovered some wonderful Instagram accounts from all over and they were the ideal diversion when even reading my beloved Georgette Heyer was too difficult to concentrate on.
      I waited for your book for yonks and believe me the wait was worth it. Not flattering when I say that – still a lad from up 'north, tha knows.

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  8. I agree with ArchitectDesign that Instagram has won over Blogging in popularity, though it fails to interest me. I shunned Facebook for years, but have come to appreciate it for what it can be; Instagram often appears on FB for those with dual accounts. Then again, I was late in coming to the blogosphere.

    The problem with interior design, in my opinion, it that there is a concerted effort to be conforming. Major American magazines clearly do not want to publish anything different than neutral schemes that showcase their advertisers' goods; it boils down to dollars and sense.

    I write my blog for my own enjoyment. Other demands have made posts less frequent recently, but I still have dozens and dozens of subjects that I want to write about. I feel fortunate that daily readership is still so high, utilizing my archives of past posts, but that lulls me into a sense that I can put off publishing a new essay, sometimes.

    Best wishes, Blue. _ JJT

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    1. The Devoted Classicist, thank you. I'm still not on Facebook and now am likely never to be. I do like Instagram a lot and I use it but is it a substitute for blogging? I think not. As for you, my blog is for my own … I was going to say enjoyment but it's more complicated than that. I began with interior design, continue with it, but it doesn't fully satisfy me as it seems the context has overwhelmed the subject.

      Best wished to you too, JJT. Remember, if you are ever here – I can walk to La Grotta for dinner/drinks.

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  9. Sorry to hear about the health issues as I am sure they are both driving you crazy. Barny is a beauty though and must make you so happy to have him. My friend just bought a new modern house and nothing she already owns goes there. She seems to really like the empty space and wants to get rid of everything. Having just sold a home, I too would like to get rid of everything.

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    1. donna baker, thank you. All is wonderful, especially the process of learning whippet. Barny is terrific and makes us both as happy as can be. For years we have resisted buying a country place but now we see the point of having acreage where Barny can run to his heart's content – the only stipulation regards architecture is that the house must be completely prefab, contemporary, uncluttered but comfortable. Oh, and none of that twiggy, antlerish nonsense as far as decor is concerned. Space is wonderful in itself and does not need to be filled.

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  10. It seems that you and I have been on the same trajectory this year. Health issues and new puppies. Yet I don't think I would have survived the former without the latter. I finally decided that clean rugs, new shoes, and the occasional "accident" is worth the love and enjoyment these creatures give us so I take it all in stride, especially the relatively new carpet that will need to be replaced like yesterday...but then again when we got it we never foresaw a Westie running after a cat in circles all day...and vice versa, now the cat has caught on to the game!

    When we are both feeling better, you will have to go OTP and bring Barny to see us. Lots of great places to run free around here.

    BTW I find everything rather boring these days, not just interior design but Haute Couture and Haute Cuisine. The world is a changing and I am oh so glad I was young and trim in another time when shoes were shoes and not architectural masterpieces!

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    1. lindaraxa, thank you darling. I wish you were feeling better. I had spinal surgery four years ago and went from wheelchair (temporarily) to learning to walk again and being pain free – I wish you the same and quickly.

      The ennui of age is deadly, but I do think you are right; the extremes of today are as uniformly banal as the language used to describe them. How American Vogue keeps going surprises me (actually nothing surprises me about that world).

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