Decorating With A Purpose: A rant in three parts

I’m usually pretty good at waiting until the stigma attached to new crazes wears off before I hop onto a particular bandwagon.   For example, I had just graduated from high school before I picked up my first Harry Potter novel, so by the time I showed up in costume to a midnight book release, Pottermania was so widespread that nobody thought there was anything too unusual about my evening plans (pink hair notwithstanding). 

Why yes, we ARE awesome, aren't we? 

This all changed recently when, while spending a few days vacationing with family friends, it was determined that I should join the new social cataloging phenomenon known as Pinterest.  For anyone who has been on an internet sabbatical or has a Y chromosome, Pinterest is basically a neverending virtual bulletin board where you can collect your favorite Google images and categorize them to make yourself appear more interesting.   At the moment, mine mostly consists of a tab of recipes I will never have time to make in real life, and some style ideas for my haircut appointment (it turned out amazing, by the way).   I do have grand plans of adding a few more ‘pinboards’ to try and maintain the status quo, though, such as “Décor for a House I Don’t Have” and “Things I Can’t Afford From Anthropologie.”

All of this (plus the clarity of mind that comes with no longer planning a wedding) has really brought to my attention the great lengths folks today will go to follow a trend.  With the downturn of the economy, it seems we are especially going to great lengths (and spending great quantities of cash) to appear totally broke.   What exactly are we accomplishing here?  I can understand perhaps feeling guilty or ostentatious for having nice things.  Instead, though, we’re becoming totally “stuff-obsessed” in an attempt to be perceived somehow as less materialistic.  I mean HELLO, you bought a house right after graduation—but sure, go ahead and be all self-congratulatory about reupholstering that loveseat you pulled out of the dumpster if it makes you feel good—I guarantee everyone who compliments you on your ingenuity secretly thinks it still looks nasty.

Oh cute, looks comfy.

Please don’t think me contrary—as the daughter of an accountant, I am no stranger to the thrill of a good deal, and anyone who knows me will tell you I am stingier than Ebenezer Scrooge himself.  My beloved kitchen table was a consignment shop college apartment purchase.  I’ve even forbidden Burke from going to the grocery store without the coupon folder.  But I can take one glance at some of the more popular wedding blogs these days and know in an instant that someone’s whimsical “DIY” wedding cost twice as much as my “PSETDIFY”* one.  The “Shabby Chic” section of Target contains some of the most expensive home goods in the entire store.   Apparently, false modesty is way en vogue.

*Pay Someone Else To Do It For You

Interior Design 101 for people like my husband who don’t understand these things:  Shabby chic is essentially when you take a piece of old wooden furniture and paint it white.  Or hot glue enough lace to stuff to make it resemble your grandmother’s sitting room—the dark, dusty one that nobody was allowed to go in except on holidays or after funerals.  It’s more or less the least masculine environment, outside of an OBGYN office, that a man can be forced to inhabit.  Fortunately for Burke and his family, though, they all live in legit old farmhouses, which is probably the only truly appropriate setting for this type of décor in the first place.    

Chic, but not shabby.

This is acceptable.

I do think part of my decorative angst comes from the fact that I live in your generic less-than-ten-years-old apartment.  Cheap appliances, bad cabinet space, white walls possessing all the charm of solitary confinement… in short, it’s hard to customize.  What I wouldn’t give for a house to furnish to my heart’s content!  Would I prefer some old sturdy wooden thing against some flimsy angular IKEA thing?  Absolutely.  But will that armchair from Craigslist seem like such a steal when it arrives at our home accompanied by bedbugs and a mystery odor?

I have no idea why women feel the need to constantly fill their homes with pointless stuff just because it’s thrifty or homemade.  If you need something, go out and get it.  I won’t judge you!  It’s okay to make it yourself, too—there’s a nice sense of pride that accompanies a satisfying craft project—but for goodness’ sake, enough with the pointless knick-knack Goodwill shopping sprees!  If you have to have something, at least consider gifting it to someone else before it’s too late: the things that you find cute today could turn you into Great Aunt Roomfullofdollsandfigurines thirty or forty years down the line.   

In summary, this:

Could potentially indicate a future involving this:

My DVR is already set!

Consider yourself warned!