A friend, in describing his interior-design plans for his new home, assured me it would be about as traditional as you could get. Original 19th Century architecture, enormous fireplace, an accumulation of wool rugs, heavy wooden furniture and antique metal fixtures-it would all add up to The Total Traditional Look, and no table, drapery or tchotchkes out of historical kilter would be tolerated.
Of course, the pivotal part of this story is that pesky word “traditional,” which will probably cause many folks to envision my friend’s abode as a sort of British men’s club replete with carved moldings, Georgian armchairs, Oriental carpets, a brass chandelier and possibly even the ubiquitous Golden Retriever or Jack Russell terrier that has come to symbolize gracious traditional taste a la Ralph Lauren.
The “tradition” to which my pal is devoted does not harken to England but rather to the American Southwest. His Navajo rugs, wrought-iron lamps, Taos couch and adobe fireplace are unquestionably “traditional.” But they reflect a very different legacy from whatever inspired the Ralph Lauren-meets-“Brideshead Revisited” fantasy. Thus, there’s a lesson to be absorbed about the nature of things allegedly “traditional”-we must constantly ask ourselves: “Whose tradition? From where and from when?”
At a time when the phrase “traditional family values” seems permanently etched into everyone’s cortex, one can’t help but notice that we are perusing the past for guidance even as we hurtle headlong into the future. It’s a peculiar paradox that tradition has become cutting-edge. Just look at recent trends in cuisine (old-fashioned cooking with gut-busting, non-nouvelle proportions), fashion (Edwardian regalia, curb-dusting skirts, lace-up granny boots) and real-estate developments (entire communities planned around notions of “traditional small-town living”).
In the realm of interior design, “traditional” has been a commercial buzzword for decades, but, as proven by my friend’s use of the term, never has its meaning been so murky and ill-defined. After all, if we choose to live in a home that evokes the ambience of 18th Century France, why is that any more traditional than surrounding ourselves with classic Modernist furnishings by Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe that have withstood almost 60 years of scrutiny? Similarly, since the seeds of new traditions evolve with each passing generation, the question of what will survive from our own era to be mined by the future becomes ever more intriguing.
With a new millennium just a few heartbeats away, our devotion to the past must yield some clues about life on the cusp of the 21st Century. “The question of what is or is not considered traditional is extremely complicated,” says Witold Rybcynski, a professor of architecture and author of the best-selling book “Home: A Short History of an Idea” (Penguin, 1986). “For instance, the word itself connotes Colonial style to a lot of Americans, which they think of as derived from the Founding Pilgrim Fathers. But what’s considered Colonial was actually an invention for the American Centennial celebrations of 1876 and therefore a contrived tradition. Since then, it has been both very popular and constantly reinterpreted, so that what passes for Traditional Colonial today is very different from what it looked liked even 50 years ago.
“But the more interesting question,” Rybcynski continues, “might be why `tradition’ has become such a warm, commercial word, and the answer has to do with a sense of fear and insecurity, that things were simply better before. In the 1950s, there was a real feeling of optimism about the future, and so everyone wanted to live in a `futuristic’ home, which was perceived as better. Now, our tendency to look backwards shows we associate the past with wealth, taste and Old World values. We never look back on the `traditions’ of poor people, even though, statistically, if we were living in those Masterpiece Theater plays, we’d be the servants.”
Angst about the future is not the only reason we insinuate ourselves into eras past: Our slavish devotion to styles and forms having little to do with the realities of contemporary life seems to be a persistent human characteristic. “People often look back to great moments in history for design inspiration,” explains Cara McCarty, curator of decorative arts and design at the St. Louis Art Museum. “Napoleon looked to Egypt, Jefferson looked to Greece and Rome, and the results were translated into architecture and furniture. This is partly about adopting the ideals of a glorious past, whether or not it has anything to do with your own past, or present. But you can’t discount the idea that people think `traditional’ design is simply prettier-they may like the richness of wood or the carving or the look of upholstery. Particularly today, when so much is mass-produced and there’s far less evidence of the hand at work, people yearn for something warm and romantic, and they believe they can only find it in so-called traditional styles.”
The security blanket that traditional design offers has not been lost on a younger generation of Yuppies and Boomers; they simply define their terms differently, and in so doing are adding new ingredients to the stew. According to New York-based trend consultant Judith Langer, “In focus groups I’ve conducted, it turns out that something we grew up with from only 20 years ago, like Kool-Aid and Jell-O, might now be seen as `traditional.’ Baby Boomers are especially in love with their youth, and even though the remembered products and styles might be more modern (than something from the 19th Century or earlier), they’re reassuring and comfortable in the same way that Ralph Lauren’s fantasy of the past is seen as welcoming.” No wonder 1950s style has become so popular among the nearing-40 set.
These days, it’s rare to find a home entirely given over to any singular period, be it traditional or contemporary, and eclecticism reigns as a predominant force in interior design. This is not surprising when you consider the frequent and profound design changes that unfolded in the past century: Overupholstered Victoriana circa 1900 led to the sleek machined lines of Art Deco and Modernism, with new materials like tubular steel, molded woods and plastics later spawning increasingly whimsical forms of the 1960s and ’70s.
The 1980s witnessed a pendulum-swing back to the fringe and froufrou of the century’s start, and the recessionist early ’90s predictably purged the more flamboyant aspects of the preceding decade.
With these whiplash-engendering shifts in taste, it’s no wonder that a stylish environment today might encompass everything from Sputnik lights and Philippe Starck chairs to tufted sofas and Bauhaus side tables. In fact, it’s this evolved creative fusion that may be identified as the traditional look of the 1990s by future generations, just as recent inventions such as the formal eat-in kitchen, the home office and the personal gym have become such popular domestic additions they may well replace parlors and dining rooms as the traditional spaces of coming eras.
On the other hand, many experts feel that a long period of incubation is required to warrant apotheosis into the realm of “tradition,” making a curator’s job of identifying the traditional objects of the future particularly difficult.
“When you have a 5,000-year slice of history to deal with, the term `tradition’ takes on a completely different meaning,” points out Ian Wardropper, curator of European decorative arts and sculpture at the Art Institute. “We look for the best of a kind, the object that distills a culture and reflects how we lived at that moment, whether it’s ancient Egyptian or Modernist. But even if we identify a contemporary object that speaks of today’s values, time needs to elapse before you can gain any perspective about it and its relevance to history. For instance, the jury is still out on Memphis furniture of the early 1980s. It was clearly an important style that spoke to a particular moment, but that in itself is not enough to make it accepted by the future and eventually become traditional.”
Rybcynski adds that what will become a tradition in the future “really depends not so much on whether something was good or bad in our century but rather what the 21st Century is interested in or concerned about. Certainly, there are people who are important because of their place in the evolution of things-Mies van der Rohe is one-but just how his own work will be thought of in the future is very difficult to say. Look at (the Bauhaus’) Walter Gropius-he was also pivotal and influential, but little of his work has survived, much less been reproduced. And what a future generation will find inspiring in a Mies chair may have very little to do with what we or Mies saw in it.”
Thus, any attempt at predicting a 1990s Period Room is all but impossible, with the Michael Graves, Dakota Jackson and Alessi products perhaps making way for recliners, picnic tables and fluorescent tube lights-haute design by 21st Century standards.
“I think you need a century or so before you can see not only what survives but what is revived and has a continued impact,” McCarty muses. “Our time seems transitional to me, as though we’re just paving the way for what will happen in the next century, and we might be remembered more for ideas than for actual products. Recycling may be the `tradition’ we establish-what we make out of our garbage for the future to inherit.”
