Rococo Revival 2006 Style
Posted in Discourse on Tue Aug 29, 06 by Kyle under Decorative Arts.
I am starting to see the stirrings of a Neo-Rococo Revival within the past year or so. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t see the Mid-century Modern or the Industrial-Loftcondo-DWR- Minimalism craze abating any time soon but I have the feeling that the zeitgeist is broadening some to let in a little more ornament and sophisticated whimsy.
The Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie twins have been coming out with various products in this vein for a couple of years now. Anthropologie has reproduction chairs and sofas in a simplified Louis VX style. Urban Outfitters’s Baroque and Rococo inspired offerings utilize either a stark black and white Gothic edge or a more contemporary bright and saturated pallet. I personally find the Anthropology furniture and accessories to be a bit too tepid and saccharine sweet for my taste. While the Urban Outfitters style is more fun and eye popping, they don’t offer enough to make any kind of integrated decor. They work better as fun accent pieces against a more neutral and modern background.
Now according to Apartment Therapy Restoration Hardware has entered the fray with its new Brocade Home collection. Unfortunately for the time being all we get to see is a meager slide show of their staged photos and some marketing copy. You’ll have to order the paper catalog to get the details. Did they just not have the money or time to do a proper website? You would think that might be a priority in 2006…
Reproduction Rococo Louis XV styled furniture is nothing new. In America it became the de-facto style of the feminine boudoir or parlor. Antiques stores and thrift stores across the nation testify to the popularity of the this French style. Watered down copies are copious and relatively studied reproductions can be found with more dedication. This popularity closely parallels the reign of the other slightly more masculine hegemon of “traditional” style, the ever-adored Colonial period. In line with this conflation gender and style, Brocade Home is specifically targeting itself at a female audience, to quote the site:
Brocade Home… a fresh new home and lifestyle brand that fuses the past with modern sensibility. It’s romantic, it’s seductive, almost always with a touch of something unexpected.
Softness meets strength… Prettiness with depth… It’s the feminine home for the 21st century.
Not a bad marketing blurb, it covers three of the major tropes of femininity used in advertising and the media. Softness meets strength. How many times have you heard that applied to everything from tissue paper, to paper towels, and baby wipes, don’t forget deodorant, and what about garbage bags… Well, I hope the idea has become clear. That set of words has become one of the central narratives used in portraying feminine identity and providing a sense of agency and empowerment while still emphasizing the need to be or at least maintain the illusion of being comforting, nurturing, pliant and submissive.
Prettiness with depth. This one is fairly obvious. It absolves us of the potential of feeling shallow based on that the fact that we are interested in looks. I wouldn’t have created this blog if I didn’t give some credence to this. So, guilty as charged. I love prettiness with depth. Although masculine proclivities would encourage me to substitute the word pretty for words such as elegant, gorgeous, or aesthetically pleasing. Of course the watchwords romantic and seductive are just more elegant words to make our eyes tug on our heartstrings among other aspects of our anatomy.
Fuses the past with modern sensibility. This one is really interesting, and really would merit several posts to unpack with any kind of sophisticated detail. Suffice it to say for now that this has been a modus operandi among designers since the 1980s, and has been especially resurgent in recent years. One question that comes to mind quickly is do these cycles have anything to do with the broken promises of the technological world? For a recent example, the dot com bust, or further back the general failure of the technological optimism of the 50s and 60s that bred the post-apocalyptic cyberpunk-tribalism aesthetic of the 80s. But I’ve become tangential and don’t want to carry on in speculative rambling for too long, so back to the furniture.
Usually the fusion of the past with modern sensibility has meant that the overall profile or outline is maintained but all pattern, ornament, and complexity of color pallet are dropped from furniture based off of historical styles or that visually cheaper materials and manufacturing techniques are used. It is hard to judge from the available pictures alone where Brocade Home fits on this spectrum. It seems to be a mix of the two tendencies, combined with a better than usual amount of attention to detail.
I have a feeling many would associate these pictures with the Victorian era, however, my sentiment is that the collection ranges closer to the 1920s America reproductions of Louis XV furniture. Victorian Rococo revival furniture was much more vigorous and muscular in its detailing and outline. The Brocade collection seems to tend more towards the dainty and delicate. I really enjoy the actual brocade patterns that are used. I have always been a big fan of flocked wallpaper and heavy floral diaper patterns. The wallpaper shown below is especially eye catching.
The color pallette is probably the most contemporary aspect of the collection. There are four dominant colors: a pink rose tint verging towards pale lavender, a subtle yellow-green that with a little more saturation could have come right from the 60s or 70s. There are also occasional interludes of coppery orange and a dusky violet. I especially like violet color of the sofa in contrast with the dark brown wood. As usual, despite the classical moldings and architectural details, the interior background is almost completely stark white making it hard to get a feel for how it would look in a setting other than a white not-quite-a-cube.
Though no-doubt on the upper end of the retail decor price scale, I would not be surprised to see this new collection do very well. It is just vigorous enough in color and pattern to feel fresh, and studied enough in its detail to escape looking cheap at first glance. I can only hope that the finishes and attention to detail that went into the photo shoot are reflected in the products themselves. Nothing ruins a nice reproduction or historically inspired piece more than a lame spray-on finish that makes cheap wood look like even cheaper plastic or other corner cuttings that ruin the aesthetic.