Stuff, Stuff, and more stuff

I’m confused. Totally, completely, utterly confounded (“I know you were blonde at one time”, you’re thinking, “but not now….”) after looking through the recent Pottery Barn catalog. I depended on Barn for the consistent representation of a very specific style: streamlined, warm, textured, inviting, and easy on the eyes. I was flipping through the January 2008 catalog and was shocked to see a far, far different style of decor throughout the rooms: what once was simple is now stuffed.

I once had a design consultation with a married couple who were arguing about the specific elements of a new decor style. When the wife referred to a Pottery Barn magazine photo of a furniture arrangement, the husband quipped “sure, it’s great, but have you ever noticed that there aren’t any PEOPLE in that picture? We don’t live like that!!!” I give the man credit; old-school, streamlined Barn style certainly didn’t allow for the daily musings of life: half-full coffee cups, books splayed on the table, or an interrupted puzzle. The new stuffed style makes an attempt at showing a “room for real life” (see page 108 of the January 2008 catalog), full of incidentals that make a room look like a family could actually live in the vignette. What these new settings fall short on, however, is reality.

We live in a time where it’s super-cool to ogle and fawn over the amazing transformations that shows like Clean Sweep and Mission Organization provide. “Those poor people”, you might snicker. “How do they live with all that junk?”, you wonder, totally oblivious to your own piles of disorganized stuff all around you. The strange thing is that despite how popular the organization shows are (hey–did you know that January is NAPO’s National Organization Month?), we live with more meaningless clutter than ever.

I absolutely applaud Pottery Barn for bringing good style to the masses. Their promotion and use of bright color to combat the Blandification of America is superb, and the quality of materials is excellent. I’m still confused, though, about what prompted the stuffing of Barn. Perhaps it went a little something like this:
“Our shoppers are complaining that the vignettes look too stuffy”, the store managers say. “Too stuffy?!”, replies the marketing director, shocked. “Well we can fix that! Let’s make the rooms unstuffy by giving them more STUFF! Yeah! THAT’s iT! More STUFF!! Start filling the displays with more of our merchandise!” “Um, excuse me”, the store manager begins. “I think you’re missing the point….”