Tchochkes

Last week I wrote a post which some people thought was rather harsh (and extremely funny) about the design firm, SpiceIT. I’m not going to apologize for that post. I still think that it takes a lot of chuztpa to put twigs in a vase in a room with only a bedroom set and call it interior design. What design? You picked out the bedroom set? You hung a net shmata from the ceiling? Not interesting, and certainly not design.

However, This week I’m going to show their living room designs, and some of these I do like.

I love color, and you don’t get much happier colors than those used in the salon above. The space is young, exuberant and inviting. I would have loved living in a place like that back in the day as a singleton in Tel Aviv.

With that said, it doesn’t say designer space to me. One hires a designer to create a look that they could not do on their own. Something divine, transcendental, incredibly different. While the space above is sweet and funky, it also wreaks of student - which is not the target market for interior designers.

The living room, above, looks almost like the pages of IKEA, only not quite as interesting. I have to admit, they lost me here. There isn’t enough color to warm the space, and the overload of IKEA furniture makes it dull. Where is the creativity?

This is what bothers me about their work. You can’t just go, pick out pieces that are already shown together in a showroom, and call it design. Design is about pulling in the unexpected, about subtlety, nuance, ambiance, and interest. Buying everything from the same shop, and slapping it together so that it looks like the showroom, is none of those things. Yes, I love IKEA and I think they do great work. I have friends with fabulous spaces where most of the stuff comes from IKEA - but not everything does. They pull things in from souk ha pish pishim in Yaffa, or tchochkes from their travels, and they create an interesting space. The space above is fine for what it is, but it is also quite dull.

My favorite part of the space above is the breakfast bar on the back wall. Otherwise, the bricks add some interest, which is good. The colors are subtle and interesting. The carpet has a nice texture. It’s ok.

Overall, the salons are better than the bedrooms. Of course, considering what I thought of the bedrooms, it really isn’t saying much.

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