[sobbybutter]

I wonder why so many people love midcentury design. It's uncomfortable, angular, fragile, cold, expensive, inhuman...you name it. Perhaps the items are just social vectors into the design world, conferring a status of "social elite" onto its participants. Any thoughts?

[msandford]

I'm a huge minimalist, and there's basically nothing else that embraces the minimal aesthetic. I paid a lot of money (as a college kid) for a pair of dressers that were made by Komfort and are very similar to this dresser: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Danish-Modern-Teak-Bedroom-Dresser-b...

As a programmer and a reductionist it's very appealing to me. It's about as simple as it can be with no extraneous ornamentation. The drawer pulls don't stick out, and the glides are hidden too.

For some reason this really, really resonates with me in the same way that Maxwell's equations are incredibly elegant or a Fourier transform explains so much of the world in such a compact way.

At risk of sounding like a hipster, I liked "midcentury modern" before Mad Men was cool. I think that my brain has worked the way it does for quite a while. I'm predisposed to liking midcentury stuff because I'm always trying to find the most compact, minimal form. In my mind the whole mapper/packer article that made the rounds a while ago helps explain it; I'm always looking for a more compact truth and that's bled over into the way I look at the physical world too.

http://the-programmers-stone.com/the-original-talks/day-1-th...

[prawn]

That dresser might be somewhat minimalist (curved bevel on the drawer faces, going by the photo), but a lot of MCM isn't to my eye. It's angled legs and curved tables and spindly frames that complicate the look IMO. There's a lot of contemporary furniture that I consider far closer to a minimal aesthetic.

[slantedview]

Some of the more revered MCM is not exactly minimalist - like maybe the Brasilia line, but I'd say that most of it is, at least more than average furniture. Consider this generic MCM styled dresser which I randomly found on Google:

http://scene7.targetimg1.com/is/image/Target/17214249_Alt01?...

It's basically a box frame on a pedestal. That's a pretty classically styled MCM dresser design, and it doesn't get much more minimalist than that: a box set on legs. But outside of the MCM era, that pure of a design was nowhere to be seen for the prior decades. In a typical house right now you're much more likely to find something like this (random from Google):

http://homesteadfurnitureonline.com/images/Dressers/master-d...

A mishmash of design elements from various periods. To me, the average MCM piece is more minimalist.

[prawn]

I think my minimalist is probably too simple - my reaction to your first example is that if the legs weren't tapered or there wasn't that inset lower base, or the legs were removed or it had inset rather than jutting handles - then that would be minimal.

But Google images suggests minimal is pretty loose! I guess it's relative.

[slantedview]

There's nothing uncomfortable or angular about many of the good mid-century designs, things like the eames lounger, the womb chair, the papa bear chair, etc. Perhaps you're confusing more contemporary (80s?) modern design with mid-century. Some of this stuff is expensive though - even the knockoffs.

The wood goods though are not cold at all, and are very warm. Teak is arguably the quintessential mid-century material, and naturally has a nice warm orangey finish. The best mid-century teak goods also feature nice curves and are not at all angular. The price on vintage wood goods is pretty good too. Everything I own was purchased for less than it would cost to purchase similar new, much lower quality, new goods. Ex: My vintage Grete Jalk dining set: $600. The best equivalent (much lower quality) Ikea dining set (Stockholm): ~$1200.

My advice is to avoid the fancy/expensive designers, consider new items for fabric goods (sofas), favor vintage for wood/case goods.

[wtbob]

Agreed—and frankly, even in the pro-modernism article the best-looking pictures had the modernist pieces arranged in what I would call a post-modernist style.

Modernism was brutalism; it was van der Rohe and La Corbusier; it was decades of architecture which, as HRH the Prince of Wales has noted, did more damage to London than did the Luftwaffe.

I'd love to see a neo-Edwardian movement: organic shapes, colour, ornament, pattern, design, delight. Or bring back the single most beautiful artistic movement in history: Jugendstil/Art Nouveau.

[prawn]

I agree, and I also think it's a fashion thing like all the other trends that return in waves. It will drop away in its time. It's popular because it's a current trend.

I think you can get longevity with any furniture (clothes, etc) if you resist purchases that are too easily defined by a style or era. That is, certain angles, patterns, shapes, etc.

Alternatively, you go for an eclectic mix or double-down on a particular style and ride it out for 20 years until it comes back!

[pjc50]

uncomfortable, angular, fragile, cold, expensive, inhuman

And therefore hugely popular with businesses that embody those qualities.

More seriously, this stuff comes in cycles. In a few years it'll be Shaker chairs or chrome-and-leather or extravagantly coloured or something. Although the cycle is anchored slighly by IKEA, who produce modernish stuff that's cheap, reliable and ubiquitous.

[visarga]

> uncomfortable, angular, fragile, cold, expensive, inhuman

elegant, simple, pure, powerful, minimalistic, geometric, and if it seems cold, it can also be funny and daring (remember the egg shaped chair?)