Curating for the future
by VISI BLOGGER Susan Perry
Recently you will have read that I had a light-hearted blog ‘spat’ with one of South Africa’s leading stylist / décor magazine contributors who came out loud and proud as a fully paid-up member of the designer copy fan club.
She had bought a set of cheap copies of a classic chair (and by “classic” I mean designer) to sit around her dining table and was thrilled with her acquisitions. I pointed out that not only was that somewhat irresponsible of someone ‘in the industry’ but that it wasn’t a very worthy purchase to shout about.
In my view, her retaliation was satisfyingly indefensible. It was mainly construed around the well-worn argument that design should be available to all – not just the wealthy – and that we live in a consumer society where it’s possible to produce cheap and relatively disposable copies of design classics, so why not enable the more financially-challenged to ‘enjoy the look’?
This was easily answered. Outside of the implications to the design world, which are many and varied, I pointed out that it was the fundamental fact that we were a consumer society that had to change. Without getting on my green high-horse, cheap copies are produced by an underpaid workforce, polluting the atmosphere with factory waste. Products are generally substandard as they have no R&D involved in the materials or structural engineering to ensure structural finesse, and will last (if you’re lucky) a few years, after which you need to throw them away and start again. How useful.
I thought of some of the pieces that I inherited from my grandparents’ loft on their death, which included (among the purely sentimental stuff) a set of Alvar Aalto bentwood stools and side table. The set wasn’t used every day in the house because it simply didn’t go with the antiques that they could eventually afford, but were from a life lived in a small London flat in the 1930s before they had money. They are now design classics. Timeless pieces.
But in 1933, it was one of the first pieces of modern furniture design that was actually suitable for mass production. It set me thinking.
Instead of griping about the cost of design classics (which have an inherent worth, but that’s another argument for another day), let’s look at current design that can be bought for not too much money.
Yes, I know, money is relative. But if we treat our furniture as we treat the pictures that we hang on our walls, as pieces that we value and love, that have some inherent meaning to us and add something to our lives, we become arbiters and curators rather than just passive consumers. We will all be involved in the debate of how design shapes our lives, of determining what is good (or poor) design.
Instead of sheepishly buying copies of the ‘real’ thing, we invest in something that has the potential to be a future design classic. By doing so, we will support our designers (instead of the cash cow plastic factories in the world’s fastest growing super-power) and our craftsmen. We support our small business owners who invest in small-volume production of items which make them proud and in which they have a vested interested to maintain quality and durability. We own pieces which might (not always, but might) become design classics of the future and give our children something in our attics when we’ve shuffled off in our FSC sustainable wood coffins.
And maybe, just maybe, if there’s enough of us who think the same way, then curating our own design futures could have a spin-off of making us curators of our planet’s current resources. Sounds like a plan to me.
About Susan:
Owner of The Modern Garden Company and The Modern Home Company, Susan Perry loves good design, beautiful buildings, and stealing sweets from her 8 year old daughter’s party packs. With background studies in Drama and 3D and Spatial Design, Susan’s aim is to create layered yet cohesive offerings for environments in which people can live with maximum comfort and flair, but minimum effort. www.moderngarden.co.za, www.takeaseat.co.za
Other articles that may interest you
1 Comments
Add a comment
Please sign in below or register in order to make a comment.
Well said. The average Joe will be more inclined to buy a knock off Chair One for instance- he's seen it in Wallpaper, he doesn't consider a greater picture, and thats the end of it. Its up to the greater design industry to inform the buying public of this debate, and an articles such as this are the way forward.