More 80s Style

LIGHTING
optical fibre lamps
globe lamps
lamps with a globe in two hands
All these were sold by shops that also sold indoor water features and reproduction phrenological heads.

tulip wall lights
lamps in the shape of old movie cameras or spot lights
quarter-circle wall uplighters
uplighters of all kinds
replica 30s bankers’ desk lights
No cylindrical lampshades were seen during the 80s. They were a throwback to the 50s, 60s and 70s (shudder). Lampshades were all conical, coolie-hat shape, often pleated.

THINGS
Kilims (woven oriental carpets) were very in, and were quickly turned into fabric design and plastic tablecloths. These lived on in cafés for far too long, in shades of navy, ochre, burgundy and forest green. And you had the fun of saying “kileem” when anyone rhymed them with “gym” or called them “keelims”. "Kilim" was the 80s’ "quinoa". The kilims (and cushions made of old ones) faded, rotted and were thrown out.

square mirrors with a row of smaller squares round the edge
mirrors with art nouveau lilies
mirrors with Op Art (Albers)

Mockintash mugs with roses (still around the 90s and you couldn’t NOT like them, same with the Clarice Cliff knockoffs)

Lazy Susans (revolving wooden tray for your pepper and salt grinders) Part of a genre of shiny, lacquered wooden kitchenware (salt and pepper grinders, salad bowls and servers, pestles and mortars) that arrived in the 70s. You could even get a chequerboard wood pestle and mortar.

glass heads, glass blocks

marble – and an Ancient Roman bling look in general
marble platonic solids (white, black, peach)
chequerboard marble ashtray
obelisks, sometimes marble, small ones to store your rings
fake marble tiles with fake marble tile dadoes

ornate “antique” bird cages (Corsican ironwork?), minus the birds
"hippo birdie two ewes" cards

FURNITURE
dark brown cupboards with fake leaded glass, or early 1800s Chinese-style lattice-work
black ash furniture
plaid sofas and chairs
cylindrical steel planters
modular seating
built-in bench seating round the walls
venetian blinds

More here, and links to the rest.

Eighties Décor

What makes you think that, Mrs Fletcher?

Was 80s design all Memphis and Sotsass – bizarre shapes, graffiti scrawls and primary colours? 80s design was many things. Kate of the wonderful mirror80.com blog sums up:

Rattan flourishes, especially on furniture
A tropical palette, reflected in soft-toned floral fabric and teal cushions
Lush vegetation motifs, from house and patio plants to fabrics and wall decor
Ceramic vases in signature ’80s colors
Asian touches, such as porcelain vases and wall art
(Mirror80.com on Golden Girls style)

Brass accents, tessellated stone that covers each piece in seamlessly applied squares, and Deco-style geometric shapes. (mirror80.com)

Anything with a grid on it. (mirror80.com)

Stair-step and diamond motifs. Teal, mauve, peach, purple and turquoise. (mirror80.com)

Rattan furniture, tropical vegetation and animal motifs were distinct trends of the time. Even the prominent clouds peeking in from the window [white painted, lattice French doors half open] … were a signature ’80s theme, often showcased in surreal artwork of the era. [French doors have white venetian blinds, there’s a rattan circular glass-topped table and a screen painted with a palm tree and lianas.] (mirror80.com)

Perhaps she’ll do Murder She Wrote now – Jessica is always staying in a hotel room with pastel flowery paper, pale Chinese vases and fabulous wall art. And the villains’ offices are full of potted palms.

There were many themes to choose from:

ORIENTAL
Black lacquer bedroom suites vaguely copied 30s and Japanese style. You sat at the dressing table in front of the pink shell-shaped mirror wearing an acetate kimono or Chinese style viscose dress with a large lily motif. Tables were low, black and Chinese style with curved legs. Art and square lanterns had Chinese characters allegedly for Life, Health and Happiness.

Translucent walls with a grid pattern recalled Japanese paper room dividers. The room was lit with square pleated paper lampshades. On the walls hung hexagonal Feng Shui mirrors and outsized red paper fans. Fan patterns were common, especially on the back of your pale pink kimono, combined with Japanese mon designs of cranes, wheat, bamboo, geometric symbols. Bamboo was big, bamboo chairs were black, and you ate off black hexagonal plates.

TWEE
There was a hedgehog+brambles+conkers aesthetic. Probably with berries. And autumn leaves and blackberries – Brambly Hedge. Corn dollies, straw hats with straw flowers, and miniature versions of the same, went with this look. The Flower Fairies were fashionable – were the books reprinted? I’m seeing apple blossom. There were endless Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady products, and Country Living magazines.

PASTEL
Apricot, chalky blue, primrose yellow. You could do a whole room in pastels with diagonal slashes, tulips, coolie-hat lampshades, Chinese vases, ikat fabrics.

HIGH TECH
Graphic designers in red-framed uber-spectacles worked at home and decorated their entire home in graph paper: mugs, fablon, curtains, probably coasters and cushions. Green on white or red on white. Room dividers and wall units were made of bolted-together scaffolding with chickenwire panels, or sheets of aluminium with holes like offcuts from some industrial process. Or was the inspiration punched paper tape from old computers? The inmates slept on futons and threw rubbish into wire bins. They used offcuts of hardboard with holes in to hang things off (with coloured pegs and wire hooks). Their children slept in wooden bunk beds with built-in desks, and their wives hung their kitchen equipment from butcher’s hooks.

ART DECO
The look revolved around huge fake Art Deco glass scent bottles (perhaps the real thing were for bath salts, not scent), “keystone” mirrors, round mirrors, apricot and mint colour schemes, curved vases, Hollywood beds on platforms. Pictures showed women with marcel waves getting into vintage taxis, or a single cocktail glass.

NOSTALGIA
Heavily influenced by the Victorians, this look combined flowery wallpaper, a flowery dado strip, a stripy dado, round tables with a long tablecloth, cushions, crocheted curtains, chintz, stencils, pastel pleated coolie-hat lampshades, crocheted lampshades (both terrible dust traps), roses, frills, pink, lace, stripes, pelmets, collectables, German rustic wooden kitchens, dried flowers, dressers stacked with flowery china, pine, pine, pine… with apricot. And then IKEA told us to "chuck out the chintz" and "don't let that doily spoil everything".

AWFUL
Very posh interiors had yellow walls and an antique globe. Sloane Rangers tried to recreate a stately home in a small flat in Fulham with a lot of forest green and burgundy, chintz and elaborate pelmets. Their china was dark green with a gold rim, or white with fluting. They liked original Victorian dark marble fire surrounds and prints of prisons by Piranesi. Their Redouté rose prints are now all faded and found at boot sales.

The middle classes went for chrome yellow, green and tomato, on twee fabric printed with all-over giraffes, stars or bears. Red and green tulip prints on chrome yellow. Rainbows in children’s bedrooms. French navy/old rose/jade/gold tiles in the kitchen. They painted floorboards white and scattered handwoven rugs that wrinkled, gathered dust and tripped you up. They filled low shelves with nicknacks from their holidays in Nicaragua and Nepal, sent each other greetings cards with sentimental cartoons, and read their children right-on fairy stories (“And so she left the prince in his palace and walked off alone into the sunset dressed in a brown paper bag”).

Essex Man loved square mirrors set diamond-wise, mirrors printed with pubiana or palm trees, amusing teapots, lamps with a globe in two hands, miniature or life-size film spotlights, glass-topped tables, lots of chrome and brass. And a jukebox.

Yes, I know I’ve skipped the 70s.

Living in Style - the 60s

Space helmets were a fad

60s interior decor and style in general was a game of two halves. In the early 60s, tasteful Swedish reigned: the lady with the beige handwoven rug with a faint brown stripe was dressed in restrictive tailoring in muted autumnal shades. By 1969 she was wearing purple velvet and living in a squat. But half-way through the decade, the colour was turned up,  and modernism mutated briefly into futurism (space-helmet hats) before morphing into Victoriana and a fascination with the 20s and 30s.

The early 60s interior

“The house was decorated in Coral’s favourite white and shades of green: white cupboards, white fireplace, white Venetian blinds, olive green and white willow-pattern wallpaper. The bathroom had some unusual features: a shaggy bearskin rug and pots of roses on top of the lavatory cistern.” (From a life of Coral Browne the actress – in the 80s she collected antiques and marble obelisks.)

pictures by Canaletto printed on melamine for a table-top

one wall in dark grey with life size silver trees (“Woods” by Cole & Sons), or black with a white brocade pattern

art featuring vintage cars, art made of watch parts in the shape of vintage cars on black velvet.

silhouettes

a giant red brandy glass on top of the television

Swedish glass - thick and dark green

candy striped sheets

nautical memorabilia especially things in the shape of ships’ wheels

16th century style sun faces.

passementerie and fringes on curtains, lampshades and bins – an odd hangover from Victorian upholstery

pale-blue velvet, pale-blue fitted carpet

prints from Boots and Woolworths: the crying boy, exotic maidens, swans, ballet dancers in swan costumes, sunbeam striking through a breaking wave. (By Vernon Ward and J.H. Lynch)

biscuit barrels etc decorated with hearts, diamonds, clubs, spades

spiral staircases

East European folk art

matching wallpaper and curtains


Late 60s decor

Around 1966 it seemed everything changed. Bridget Riley's geometric "dazzle" paintings became fashionable Op Art. Mary Quant's clothes for teenagers were all black and white. We wore white eyeliner. We painted our fingernails white. We chucked out the coral lipstick and wore - white. (Beige was more flattering.) We wore Op Art dresses, Op Art PVC (a new wonder-fabric) raincoats and hats.

The word "trendy" came into being. Trends came thick and fast.

Everything was “fun” and throwaway: paper lampshades, slot-together plastic lampshades, self-assembly paper chairs, modular cuboid furniture, paper knickers (they live on in hospitals), paper carrier bags (perfect for advertising and for making a statement).

Bright Casa Pupo rugs replaced the beige haircord. They came in flowery patterns and went with thick white pottery.

We chucked out the Sheraton and hung circular mirrors with thick red frames. We weren't quite sure what Pop Art was, but we got the look.

We lounged in peacock chairs, basket chairs suspended from the ceiling, or hammocks.

We chucked out our restrictive "girdles" and wore tights instead. Men's shirts and ties were going to be replaced by nylon turtle-neck shirts. Dull evening dress was jazzed up. Middle-aged men grew their hair longer, and grew mutton-chop whiskers which went perfectly with giant blue velvet bow-ties, kipper ties and frilled shirtfronts. (They grew the hair but failed to wash it more often. And it looked very silly combined with a combover. These ghastly aberrations soon faded from the scene.)

Op art was followed by psychedelia: There was a fashion for taking hallucinogenic drugs – because they made you see the world in bright rainbow colours. Manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon and added vivid, clashing colours to their patterns for fabric, clothes and wallpaper: lime-green, orange, purple, pink, yellow, turquoise. Green/purple was popular. Patterns were swirly. Paisley (from Victorian era Indian shawls) was already fashionable – now it became bigger and brighter. Jacobean embroidery went through yet another regeneration. Op Art was remade in lime and pink. You could get a psychedelic mini-kaftan with a ring-pull zip and flared sleeves in M&S. Very daring. Posters, magazines, graphics had the look. It dated very fast.

Psychedelia was replaced by a depressing hippy ambience with burgundy walls, a vague 30s/Victorian feel, everything old and dusty, curtains closed during the day, purple ostrich feathers from Biba, old lace clothes hung up, old shawls, vases with incense (which left dust and bits everywhere). Spanish and Chinese shawls. Kimonos and printed silk.

Women who lived in a room like this had a chest of drawers and dressing table mirror, but the drawers wouldn’t shut, all surfaces were covered with clutter, the mirror was draped with bead necklaces, the dressing table covered with cheap little boxes. The brass bed had clothes hanging off the end. There’d be an orange crate by the bed for a lamp and an overflowing ashtray. The rest of her clothes hung on a hook on the back of the door. If there was a wardrobe her best clothes would be in a heap on the floor of it.

In every bedsit, there was an oblong art deco mirror hanging from a chain, and a central light with a marbleized bowl shade. Both going for £££££s in vintage shops today.

On the walls were posters of Alphonse Mucha and Van Gogh’s sunflowers. People with degrees had prints of Sienese art.

It wasn't really that seamless: hippy flowery fabric was both around in the early 60s – before hippies. When hippies came in (summer of 67), flowery fabric was swiftly labelled “hippy”. Colours were getting brighter before “psychedelia”. Daisies were “in” in the early 60s too - but they were quickly whipped into service for “flower power”.

Fashion Crimes of the Past

More here.

Living in Style 2

Arty types in the 50s liked "objets trouvés", or "found objects":

"Unusual objets trouvés were displayed everywhere - a Webb toy theatre, a model of an old steam engine, a rocking-horse, a row of marionettes, a ladder painted with stars and diamonds, an American wall clock with an enormous winking eye painted by Ronald on its pendulum." (piece about Ronald Searle’s modernist home)

More conservative homeowners filled their homes with the three "see no evil" monkeys, a set of three elephants in descending size order, a set of three camels chained together, and silhouettes of the pyramids with a background of blue moth wings. They also liked horse brasses, and mats showing Old Cries of London or Venice in the eighteenth century. The monkeys shared the mantelpiece with miniature suits of armour, tiny beer barrels, scaled-down brass cannon, and calendars set in the side of a wooden dog. They ate their dinner off Myott Chinese bird plates or willow pattern china.

Picasso became popular because there was a big exhibition. If he was too modern, you could hang reproductions of Dutch flower paintings with very realistic drops of water, butterflies, slugs etc; Tretchikoff’s green lady; paintings of white horses galloping through the surf; or a much reproduced depiction of a breaking wave with a shaft of light gleaming through it (was it part of Boots' art range?). These shared the walls with hunting scenes and framed golfing jokes.

Teenage girls hung paintings of swans or Degas' ballet girls above their divan beds (with folkweave coverlet).

Working class people bought Beswick china flying ducks modelled on paintings by Peter Scott.
Middle class people despised these, and hung Peter Scott prints, and elephants by David Shepherd.

Also seen about were stripy awnings with scalloped edges combined with modernist architecture and (oddly) fairground lettering, or with curly wrought iron.