What I find interesting is her use of pink in the seventies, even her dressing of Anderson. In the 1970's during the women's movement even Sears did not have any pink for two years running.

I hope little Anderson didn't suffer on the playground due to his moms creativeness. The gender ID association by color that was in full swing since the 1940's ( and a tic earlier) was still going strong at that point of time.

Delving a little more into how things fall along the spectrum, I think the very rich often fall on the same end of the spectrum behavior and experience-wise as do the poor, or at least behaviors that the middle classes prescribe to the lower classes and the "vulgar".

Look at her life. A custody battle, alcohol and and lesbianism alluded to during the trial; a marriage at 17 to a man twice her age; who was an alleged mobster and pimp, who beat her; three other marriages: affairs; the early death of a husband from probably treatable medical issues; shacking up with a man of a different race at a time when this was rare; the suicide of one of her children right in front of her; estrangement from one of her other children.

Again, the two extremes falling closer on the spectrum than "respectable" people in the middle.

I guess that is what happens when one is unshackled from the tyranny of bourgeois expectations, at both ends of the spectrum.

Tolstoy also wrote a book called What Is Art? He was raised in an upper class family and felt guilty for it and also felt guilty for enjoying opera and ballet. I do not particularly agree with Tolstoy's theories about art, but his quote about houses does seem to make a good point. He did not like the nouveau riche.

I prefer Kierkegaard's theory, which is that "boredom is the root of all evil", explaining why people like to change their decor frequently - to fend off boredom. My favorite work of Kierkegaard's is his "Either/Or", which is not an entire book, but is fairly long for a short piece.

I very much agree about beauty and ugliness..that actually speaks to me a lot, even though I wouldn't be able to explain it myself

and of course I feel the same about autobiography..

(I'm annoyed with the level of today's articles, but that's a different topic..:) It's a major magazine, I suppose people actually getting payed for whatever they write there, and others, for what they edit..?

I only imagine how many things they get wrong that I wouldn't know they do since I've no previous knowledge about them

They are amazing with their visuals and photography though..there, they know their stuff)

I was lucky to see the Amber Room..the Malachite Room..no, it's actually beautiful..of course it's over the top-everything in Russia is traditionally over the top when it comes to very rich and influent people..they're not the top out of sight:) They're very much in your face. Unless they want to create a legend they're not.

Yet the materials itself and the level of artistry is breathtaking. One feels a bit like in a church..too much work and inspiration went into it, too much not to admire it deeply..

The decorative elements in Russia strive to be rounded, if I think about it. Lots of floral motives (hence my early imprinting lol)..

Ukraine-the folk motives there(clothes etc) still favor florals a lot, but also the lines-say, in embroidery, are more straight, less wavy..cross-stitching etc..

The traditional woodwork is beautiful, very elaborate.

My late relative was a talended amateur craftsman..I still have a couple of smaller gifts from him, but he actually embellished his and his kids' houses in various traditional Ukrainian motives, from top to bottom..looked a bit strange with the houses being already in Israel..:) Cognitive dissonance..

(they emigrated in late nineties and came to be close to my parents..

They are very multi-national family..I adore them. I really miss the ones who died..)

I think there is no right or wrong in changing decor frequently if you can afford it. I mean...an Artist wouldn't want to keep painting the same picture over and over. For some it is in their DNA to keep creating. It's not exactly boredom it's a need or outlet. It's about being overwhelmingly inspired by something. It can't always be contained to sameness.

(thank you Lars for mentioning the books.,I guess I've some reading to do..at some point..

one needs to structure their time, that's true:) people invest lots in that time structuring..

I'm not sure I agree it's boredom though., I think a tad more complicated than that. But I don't want to go even more off topic than I usually do)

I think also that we have to remember that Gloria had much association with some of the worlds most talented artisans in one form or another. That in it's self creates a strong energy for creative endeavors if one is so inclined. Hence her frequent redecorating? I think on a small scale all of us can rembember that one neighbor or friend that was creative and inspired our own creativity to flourish during that time frame. It's a nice energy.

April, here are some quotes from Kierkegaard. This is the best translation of Kierkegaard, IMO, published by Modern Library. You have to read quite a bit of the piece to understand Kierkegaard's philosophy regarding boredom. Although he did not consider his work humorous, many people laughed when he read it aloud. He has a certain way of making a point that some people have trouble understanding, but I find his work very entertaining. I do think his work relates to the urge to redecorate, and it embraces this urge as a good thing.

What I find interesting is her use of pink in the seventies, even her dressing of Anderson. In the 1970's during the women's movement even Sears did not have any pink for two years running.

But colors were not as gender-fied then as they are now. My dad, like many, many other men had some pink shirts in the 70s and nobody thought anything about it. Yeah, there was the pink/blue thing for babies, but after that it wasn't nearly as big a deal as it is now. No straight man thought he would get cooties because the house happened to have a pink bathroom. All that is a fairly recent phenom.

ETA Of course, pink was out as a bath color by the 70s, but nobody who bought a house was ripping out pink tile just because of the color, not back then.

Thank you Lars..I guess I'll get the book since I haven't yet been dissapointed by any book suggested here..

The truth is I never read Kierkegaard yet..for very very strange reasons..he was one of the favorite authors of one of my friends, and our relationship goes on and off for years and still somehow manages to put me on the edge. Maybe finally reading Kierkegaard himself will help me to put things in a bit of perspective..which is about time..:)

Writer, my husband wears pink golf shirts and pink ties and a few years ago had a pale pink dress shirts. In the early eighties and very last of the seventies there were lots of heterosexual men who wore pink and green, particularly here in Florida. Pink is sooo much more common for men now than most of the seventies. I lived in MI during the seventies and never once saw a man or boy in pink.

My father wore open collared pink dress shirts in the 70s too.

I never saw a man wear pink till I moved to Florida in 78'. Never ever saw it before that so maybe it was regional. I certainly never saw a boy of elementary school age wear pink tops in the seventies. Not back in those days. It's very very common today and I'm glad it has gained momentum. The color is good for my husbands skin tone.

ETA: I talked to my husband about this. He is from England and can't ever remember seeing a man or boy in pink in the 70's. He also moved to Florida in 78' and that was his first experience seeing it but added that was mostly on the golf course (pink and green).

He told me to say he now even has pink underwear lol.

justerrilynn

What
I find interesting is her use of pink in the seventies, even her
dressing of Anderson. In the 1970's during the women's movement even
Sears did not have any pink for two years running.

I hope little Anderson didn't suffer on the playground due to his
moms creativeness. The gender ID association by color that was in full
swing since the 1940's ( and a tic earlier) was still going strong at
that point of time.

*******************************************************

Remember too they are/were WASPS - pink and other similar strong colors aren't unusual

....these are people(men) who wear pants with little crocodiles(Lilly Pulitzer) on them

As an aside, if you watch the series Southern Charm set in Charleston,the men on that show are not afraid to wear colorful clothing,

As for GV's 70's bedroom - it is OTT... and I applaud her guts not playing it safe with the decor.

She sounds a bit unhinged. I say that not to poke fun, but when you basically have no limits created by finances, social opportunity, etc., it would be easy to go off the rails. Oh, about the room - too much for me.

I think the visceral hatred of pink in interior design is primarily female driven. And it does have something to do with gender-assigned colors, the "pink for girls" thing. (Being so close to New Jersey-sorry I have to bring up that regional thing again), I see enough pink based interiors like living rooms and master bedrooms that I have to think that if the woman likes pink, the husband doesn't really care one way or the other. My older interior design friend said that for the majority of his clients, the men did not care if the master bedroom was pink or peach or some "feminine" color or if the furniture was French looking and "delicate" or anything like that. What most of them DID care about, was they did not want ruffles or lace especially on something that could touch their face like pillows or bedding or canopies or that would "get in their way" like fussy drapes. They didn't care if it was pink or floral or how it looked, but how it "felt" was important.

When my mom brought in a new interior designer to update the master bedroom after the dog died, the 1975 version was grasscloth, linen with coarse tassels on the draperies, and a geometric floral pattern on some things with blue delft (stylized flowers) lighting. The interior designer said "Okay, so this is your husband's bedroom, where do you sleep?" Even though it was pastel colors and there was a bit of geometric Floral, she assumed it was a man's room, because it was not extremely feminine. She said most married couples she did masters for had distinctly feminine, peach, pink, floral bedrooms because that's what the wife chose and the husbands didn't think about it one way or the other (in terms of their masculinity).

She sounds a bit unhinged. I say that not to poke fun, but when you basically have no limits created by finances, social opportunity, etc., it would be easy to go off the rails.

This kind of goes back to what I was saying about the spectrum though, because the limitless finances and social opportunity may also have the same effect as no finances and no opportunity.

Custody battles, alcoholic parents, hints of sexual "flexibility", serial marriages, children out of wedlock or by men other than to whom they are married, shooting at each other, running each other down in cars---I can point at people where I grew up who have these stories but it's just that nobody is particularly interested in them because they aren't rich and famous and the media is not involved. My dad was in the ER when a man came in with a mostly amputated penis Years before Lorena Bobbitt hit the news. The man just happened to wake up in time that his wife didn't get it all the way off and throw it away like Lorena did. The man, or my dad, who did his best at sewing it up didn't get on the news because it was in the middle of nowhere and they didn't want to be.

I know that's way off topic. Sorta.

Quite different from Anderson's pads.

NYC penthouse

Hamptons

By comparison I think his stuff is awfully dull. There's nothing wrong with it, but it could belong to anybody who could afford the property. They are impersonal like an expensive Airbnb or something.

Wonder if that's a reaction to early extravagant surroundings?

My husband hates and forbids all pink in interior design *sigh* even coral is too close for him. I think he'd like it if I could sneak it past him!

Really enjoying reading others thoughts about this room. Pal, thanks for sharing.

It's a nice distraction while I am waiting on hold and fighting with my credit card company.

He does seem to have gone in the totally opposite direction - very minimal. Almost like nobody lives there.

It looks like he is very attracted to order and calm.

I like the looks of the big communal sink in the bathroom but personally wouldn't be keen on seeing someone else's toothpasted mouth spit in direct view if I was sharing.

When I was studying interior design at UT Austin in 1987, I audited a color theory class taught by a professor from England, and he said one day that pink was only for women and that men could not wear pink. I happened to be wearing a hot pink satin tie that day, and when he glanced at me, he said, "except perhaps for a pink tie." The next day I showed him a 1981 family portrait (central Texas) with my family on a red Farmall tractor, and I am dressed in head to toe pink - pink cotton slacks (from Brazil), pink plastic shoes (from Greece) with pink lamé laces, pink lamé socks (from the Funny Farm in San Francisco), pink skinny belt (women's dept of Neiman-Marcus), and a pastel pink shirt. He then said to me, "I stand corrected!" A woman in the ID department told me that I could get shot for wearing that outfit in certain parts of Texas, and I did not doubt her, as I was used to having insults hurled at me in places like Waco at that time. In 1981 I lived in San Francisco, but I moved to Austin in 1985 to get an Interior Design degree, and the culture shock was somewhat overwhelming to me, even though I grew up in Texas.

In Mexico, hot pink or magenta is considered a masculine color for a man's shirt.

Wonder if that's a reaction to early extravagant surroundings?

Probably, but minimal can be done in more interesting ways than that. I just feel like you have no clue as to what sort of person lives there at all.

I wonder if one day, people are going to regret having furnished their houses as though they were being staged for resale.

The only thing I can think of in defense of this style, especially for someone who is busy with a booming career, is that AC has chosen to decorate his spaces in a style that requires little thought on his part- even granting that he would not be the one actually doing the thinking- but spaces like his mother's are not 100 percent the work of the ID without a good bit of input from the client, no?

As for pink, it is such a flattering color, it would be a shame if men were not able to wear it or live in it.

(as for pink and blue-I read in several sources it was all the other way around until World War One..they wanted then to switch and associate blue with manhood since the military uniforms started being blue or something? I don't want to lie which country uniforms, I forget, but it had to do with the war..can be googled of course

before that red was considered a color of force and masculinity, thus pink was a softer version of it for small boys

While the virginity and feminity and purity etc were strongly associated with light blue..so great color for little girls back then

But I guess they also weren't as much preoccupied with that stuff as it might seem

Dressed both boys and girls in light colored dresses until three years old or something..

By the way all that reading gave me a new interesting perspective, about that famous painting, "The Blue Boy"..which, hey, as I see now is actually in California! but can't be viewed for several months because of some restoration work to be done

Luckily for me, the men in my family are fine with pinks and reds and whatever..too many frills might be too much I guess...so I admit I'm lately more into it(probably has to do with aging lol)...but I go really slow wih that....like a touch here..a touch there..

(my ex looked amazing in pink, my son does..DH goes for different shades of red..

I don't understand why not to wear colors if they're flattering?..unless you have certain traditions or job requirements or something

I love pink and red..I wear them a lot especially on days I'm happy and confident..or want to uplift my mood

My grandfather wore dresses as a young child in the 1880s. Culturally, dresses were "childrens" clothes, not limited to girls, and superstition kept some young boys in dresses longer (to prevent them from being abducted by fairies). They "breeched" or switched to pants when they went to school.

"to prevent them from being abducted by fairies"-oh wow, that's really interesting

i'm so much into folk and ballads..and yes now as I think of it-boys or young men are abducted by faires..as in "Tam Lin", or Thomas the Rhymer..I wonder why is that...

.I wonder why is that...

Just think about "Tam Lin" and why he's there:

"And pleasant is that faery land to those that in it dwell,

but at the end of seven years they pay a teind to hell,

And I'm so fair and fu' of flesh,

I fear 'twill be mysel'"

IIRC (too lazy to be sure the dialect is right; just as much as I remember off the top of my head)

The gentleman feared being put to death as a sacrifice because he was big and handsome.

right..that i understand..:) but why they were never interested in girls?

or different fairies had..umm..different agendas?

I have this book, "Faeiries", by Brian Froud and Allan Lee..for years already..pixies are the cutest. actually made the door plate with a pixie I copied from it..that was on our door lol..I made another one for my brother's family. I was into painting on wood. a bit of decoupaging, etc.I totally forgot it, and now it came to me during this conversation. hm.

so back to the book..some witches are the scariest I ever saw..faeries that look like girls are totally magical..and there are also many other creatures..some similar to Russian folklore creatures, some not at all..

i also think that "Thomas the Rhymer" for example-is a very interesting take on a fate of a poet...a symbolical one..

maybe they saw boys as more talented and..different. Faeiries I mean..))

You know, you might want to read The Perilous Gard by Elizabeth Pope. It's an older book, but it was a Newbery winner, so it's still probably available. It's a novel about a young girl during the reign of Mary Tudor who finds herself entangled with the last remnant of the "fairy folk" and it does a very nice job of speculating on the realities behind just those ballads you've mentioned. Good read, too. The author was the Shakespeare professor at one of the universities in California, but I forget which one.

Thank you writersblock! on my list as well. found it on Amazon within a second

More off topic, but you might like the book The Real World of Fairies by Dora van Gelder. I've had this book since the 1970s (I think) and found it a very interesting description of nature and how Western culture has lost touch with much of it. The author was born in Indonesia, when it was the Dutch East Indies.

I have also always been interested in folk literature and have collections from many countries, from Russia to Guatemala. I also have DVDs of several Russian folk tales, including Ruslan & Ludmila (a two-disc set) from Ruscico. I first saw this movie at a Russian Film Festival at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. I was very impressed with the lavish sets, decorations, and costumes. I can see a connection to Gloria's style.

Another article: At Home with Gloria Vanderbilt.

Interesting how these threads morph. I just finished reading the bio of Richard Dadd who did some remarkable paintings while in the insane asylum.

The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke

I also watched a horrible pretentious video of an interpretation of the meaning of Dadd's painting where the expert explained that Dadd painted himself as the man with the ax and the little man squatting was his father (he killed his father in real life). There are other interpretations as well but who would really know. It is now thought that Dadd was a schizophrenic .

I love threads like this.

I just found a Queen's song describing the painting/dedicated to it. never heard it before. very cool I must say

it's amazing how much one can learn during one thread

thank you, everyone

going to read the article now

and I bought all the books mentioned..luckily they didn't cost much..I'm a bit crazy myself today lol

read the article, watched the slide show..very interesting..I can see she liked the Canopy Designs chandeliers too..:)

yes, I also love threads like this

I've heard that interpretation, justerrilynn, and never understood it, because he's clearly aiming at the nut standing all by itself in the middle of the ring of onlookers. To hit the squatter from that distance he would have to throw the axe and be as likely to cut off the legs of the female fairy next to him. I always thought it was more interesting as an example of how a theory can prevent you from seeing what is plain before you than an explanation of the painting.

If you're ever in London it's worth looking for the painting in the Tate, although these days they won't let you look at it (or any other works of art there) much. As soon as you stop moving the guards focus and start moving in. I guess you're supposed to shuffle along so you can say you've seen stuff without actually ever really looking at it.

Writer, I may have been to the Tate on my first trip over around twenty years ago. I have little memory of that first week. It's a long story about a bad flight, a hairy armpit man in a wife beater shirt with four teens and the three nights running case of the squawking sea bird. All I remember is a barge ride, a large galley with husband complaining and my four year old running out into a busy roundabout. If I would have seen the painting at that time my interpretation would have been a mad woman smashing glass in a fragmented world of another dimension.

Now that a number of mental illnesses are controlled with medication on an out patient basis and autism/Asbergers is more fully understood I think it has put a damper on certain types of artistic expression. Even the SSRIs and Dopamine Norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors for mild depression and anxiety have dampened people's creative drives. I know artists and writers who can't really produce when medicated.

That and...books for children are very practical compared to the good fairy tales of my youth. Kids also do a lot of computer games and such. I wonder if little by little we a doing away with imagination all together.

Oh, it's more than just that, I think. Nowadays when you run across, say, the name of a plant you don't know or a place you've never heard of in something that you're reading, you just go look it up online and then usually immediately forget it, whereas in the pre-internet world, you made up an idea of what it would be like. It was often wildly wrong but at least you exercised your creative facilities that little bit. Even that little is totally gone now.

OMG writersblock, you have described my life perfectly. I am making a huge effort to get back to paper and pencil again. I am journaling, drawing, note taking, all in an effort to hold on to my ideas, creative impulses and not just watch my version of cat videos on an endless loop.

Even my children can see how if the world always had the internet as we have it today, we would be much the poorer for it. Mind you they see that, but it's like knowing heroin is bad when you are an addict. Easy to spot the trouble. Hard to stop using. DS1 wants a watch for when he goes to college so that he does not look at his phone for the time and get distracted by the latest Reddit thread or Vice video.

Of course there is tremendous good about the online world too. Look at us here enjoying camaraderie and ideas with cyber neighbors and the ability to learn how to do just about anything is marvelous- but it seems to all get in the way of creation somehow.

So the faeries are abducting us after all. They live on our screens and we look into their lights seduced by the pretty images.

As for Pal's point about mental illnesses, while I believe there are a number of mental illnesses that are better controlled by modern medications, I worry when I see normal parts of life turned into mental illness and medicated. The result being a loss of productivity for the benefit of pharma. We have turned sadness and anxiety into illnesses. And while things like that can become pathological, I cannot tell you how many of my children's friends take anti-anxiety medicine (starting in elementary school.) How can that be?

Down the road they will probably discover the children who have anxiety in school now would have been the creative kids in school if their art and music outlet hadn't been taken away for continuous testing.

Yes, I also see that the fact that digital is so easy has a very bad effect on many artists. I can think of one contemporary surrealist whose early work I greatly admired, but with doing everything digitally it's so easy to make a new work that he now churns out tons and tons of stuff that's all just variants of the same few early works. I can't help but feel that if he had to go to the trouble of getting and preparing canvas for every work and mixing paints and waiting for things to dry in between steps, his output would be maybe a third or less of what it is, but so much more artistically valuable.

Frankly, I'd rather be abducted by faeries..)) with the opportunity to come back of course

I think..we're not built to be overstimulated like we're now..

we're also not built to be extremely understimulated. Boredom inspires creativity; it's healthy to be bored from time to time..you start thinking, imagining, noticing details..but the extreme lack of stimulus can push one to madness. It just rarely happens; but it's a known thing.

The other extreme though, being constantly bombarded by information, can very easily bring on anxiety etc

We always filter of course ..otherwise would be impossible to handle it...only the tip of the iceberg of information we get is accessible to us, which is a pity but also a blessing..but I really think that what happens now is majorly overwhelming. Most people are always online, always, at least seemingly, within reach..me, I at least don't have iPhone etc(for which I get constantly reprimanded by friends and family..I'm constantly trying to explain myself and they just don't seem to get it)

DD says:

-Mom, but if somebody sends you something, or remarks on something, and it's not important, you can just ignore it, you know?

No, I don't know. Isn't it rude, to ignore someone? Who doesn't deserve it, who probably waits for some sort of reaction, even minimal one, some acknowlegement?

I'd be struggling for my mental survival..

I know it might be really, really useful sometimes..but what with in between these sometimes?..

And if something/somebody is not that important, why to have this constant access to each other?

Here, it's different..people write, you have a choice to write or not.

There, it seems to me it's my choice is either to say something or to forever hold my peace lol