*LONG ONE, BUT WE PROMISE IT’S FUN. OPEN IN YOUR BROWSER?*
IN THIS ISSUE:
EMBRACING YOUR INNER-TERIOR CHILD IS AS EASY AS A, B, C:
A) THE PLAYFUL BARRIER: obliterate the walls you’ve built
B) The FORT vernacular: the calming benefits of a nest within your nest
C) MURALITY: the righteous use of Murals throughout history (beginning in 1987)
A WAY TO GIVE BACK: Please force your friends to SUBSCRIBE
Dear Snoops,
Youth. It’s a historical obsession. Naughty Emperor Hadrian, Kardashian prototype Dorian Gray, and party maestro Lisle von (portrayed by Isabella Rossellini, pictured below). These people wanted to possess or embody physical youth – and they were all super fucked up by that. (*We won’t be providing analysis.)
But what might happen if, for example, instead of looking young, we inhabited youthful spaces?
Today, we rewind the clock and APPROPRIATE CHILDREN’S INTERIOR DESIGN CULTURE, asking you - the reader - to reconsider the common wisdom that “maturity” is “progress”.
REGRESS, READERS! REGRESS!
HOW TO ACHIEVE “CHILD”:
A. REDEFINE BARRIERS AS SOMETHING FUN TO CRASH INTO
We will begin with some inspiration from one of our go-to interiors inspirators CONCORDE, who are based in ultra-sexy, kid-unfriendly MILAN.
In lieu of some kind of Prison Bars banister-baluster situation, or God forbid some kind of glass partition, CONCORDE makes the CHILD-WITHIN decision to go with BLACK NETTING.
Netting, which in its adult form is called “MESH”, is curious because it is both a distinct barrier but also pliable and fun to ram into. It is PLAYFUL BARRIER, and that is a principle of Childhood Freedom one can easily regain.
1.1 HOME AS (BOUNCY) CASTLE: a note on architecture
Playful Barrier reaches its zenith with the BOUNCY CASTLE, which were, in fact, developed by a *NASA* PLASTICS SPECIALIST. Surely a hot Dad.
The Bouncy Life, and the desire for AIR TO LIFT US and our spaces, was in fact part of an architectural and artistic MOVEMENT:
The inflatability of architecture had a radical moment in the 1960s, immediately after the NASA bouncy castle work (see ANT FARM collective), and a mainstream moment in Australia in the 1970s, with the BINISHELL (by a one Mr. BINI) - a kind of thin-shell structure lifted up with air pressure.
D’you know who has a BINISHELL in MALIBU? Robert Downey fucking Junior:
ARE YOU A RICH A.F. 40-SOMETHING WITH A NOSTALGIA FOR 1990s INFLATABLE FURNITURE?
Then your man is Vietnamese MAESTRO OF BLOW-UP, Quasar Khanh. The shit is CHIC:
You can buy something “IN THE STYLE OF” Quasar on 1stDibs, but it’ll set you back.
B. SPACE-WITHIN-A-SPACE: THE FORT AS HAPPY PLACE
There is a legit psychology behind the calm we feel in small spaces, it’s a kind of NEST reaction, which is to say: SECURITY. And it “today’s uncertain world”, any dose of security is very fun and sexy.
ASIDE: THE KID FORT is also reflected in more permanent arrangements, as kids rooms are often treated as KITCHEN-LESS STUDIO APARTMENTS, which many functions crammed into one. See below.
The fort as approached from the adult perspective pretty much only works for LOFTS – because in a cramped apartment, you don’t necessarily need to make sub-spaces – but regardless, they can be charming. Here is one by designer PETER STAMBERG (still doing playful things) circa early 1980s:
We could go on about FORTS, especially because of the fabric-ceiling-as-tent vibe which we have some super source images for. But there’s so much to cover, we just have to keep moving.
So, ONTO…
THE MOST FORT-Y FURNITURE
THE VITRA LIVING TOWER by VERNON PANTON, 1969
SAME BUT DIFFERENT (AND *EARLIER): THE MALITTE SYSTEM by ROBERTO SEBASTIÁN MATTA
One was for sale by FOR SCALE favorites SAME OLD, might still be. We recommend clicking through to see these four pieces separated. Because you can do that, and they still look cute.
THE MAH JONG SOFA by ROCHE BOBOIS (favorite furniture maker of CARMELLA SOPRANO), 1971
ONE MORE: THE IKEA CLASSIC, 1973’s TAJT ONE-PERSON FUTON (cause if you have a futon, nobody is staying over, Ok?)
Recently sold by FOR SCALE friend BILLY. THIS FOLDS OUT, obviously:
WHAT WAS IT ABOUT THE FORT AND THE MID-1960s to MID-1970s? (Genuine question.) The decade of FORTABLE FURNITURE.
GUEST COMMENTARY
THE FURNITURE-LESS ROOM AND THE DEVELOPMENTAL NECESSITY OF FLOOR TIME, A.K.A. “THE CHILD LOUNGES”
BY LIFE-AS-PARENT CORRESPONDENT, and co-founder of the astonishing magazine MOTHER TONGUE, MELISSA GOLDSTEIN
There is a scene in the classic ’90s film Mermaids, in which Bob Hoskins’ character babysits for Cher’s character’s kids, played by Christina Ricci and Winona Ryder.
Hoskins (who in real life was English! which I always forget) and the girls decide to decorate Ricci’s room in an underwater theme, because she’s like a swimming prodigy or something. The fact that he is up for this impromptu conceptual makeover project is emblematic of the fact that he is the babysitter (trying to woo Cher, obvs), and not the single parent raising and financially supporting two girls in the 1960s, but I digress.
They paint the room in a bold palette of blues, add some cut out paper forms—fish and lobsters and the like, and finish with 3D papier-mâché elements (seaweed, coral, underwater cave rocks). The pièce de résistance is a DIY projector which features a spinning lamp shade that Hoskins and co. personalize with wavy line cutouts. When the light shines through, the walls are transformed into this lo-fi undersea wonderland — the sort of thing that would appear on the collaborative nursery Pinterest board of Wes Anderson and Michel Gondry.
There is no furniture in this room, and yet it is maybe the best room ever? With its absence of seating options, save for a rug, the room demands that you lounge, which jives with child development in general, with its emphasis on floor time, circle time, rug time. And come to think of it, maybe we should all be spending more time splayed out on a shag rug with floor pillows? Anyways all of the design in this room is in service of the atmosphere, the magic. And I love that about it.
C. MURALITY AS MORALITY: THE MURAL IS RIGHTEOUS
The world first learned the charm of the mural in 1987 in the Surrealist Film “Three Men and a Baby”:
To Dad was to Art.
We were reminded of the righteousness of the MURAL again in Mermaids, 1990 (as Life-As-Parent Correspondent Melissa Goldstein has just illuminated for us), where a man overindulges the children of the woman he’s trying to seduce. This is done through the art of Mural.
Murals, we posit, are the decorative equivalent of DRESS FOR THE JOB YOU WANT. And, this is an excellent reason to befriend or become an artist, because the most valuable murals are ones that have some layered personal connection.
ASIDE
A note on the adultness of murals: years back, friends of FOR SCALE collaborated on a domestic mural. Its subject was a collage of hand-painted flaccid penises, all belonging to the mutual friends of the home owners and the artist. We can’t share the result, but it gave HENRI ROUSSEAU.
Murals and kind-of-murals (that are 3D and we we often call “Installations”) are super duper cute, and used also for PUBLIC ADMIRATION. One very new one we love are the windows at London’s (once-upon-a-time-Canadian-owned) Selfridges, by our own artist-friend JOHN BOOTH.
WELL, WELL SNOOPS. We did go a bit overboard on length here, but it turns out we’re huge fans of YOUTHFULLY SPIRITED INTERIORS. And we think you should be too.
Until next week. LOVE AND GOOD LUCK,