Tag: maximalism

M is for Midtown and Manhattan and Mamdani (and much more)

It’s been a year since I wrote about New York City and two years since I’ve visited. Who knows when I will be back. I do know I still love to read about it, which isn’t hard, since it’s often in the news. So here’s my annual post on NYC, brought to you by the letter “M”.

Midtown: First off, shout out to Midtown Manhattan, a much maligned part of the city. As this piece shows, it had quite the year, between the Knicks winning the NBA championship to Taylor Swift getting married. Mind you, it had some bad things happen, like this collapsing high rise,  That said, this quote sums things up: “Midtown is not usually cool, but, right now, it kind of is.” I’ve always had a soft spot for Midtown, so I am glad it is getting some love.

Relatedly, I really liked this piece: “As a child growing up in Midtown Manhattan, I learned to speak apartment very early.”

Mayor Mamdani: Much ink has been spilled on the new mayor of New York, the indefatigable Zohran Mamdani. It seems every day he and his team and promoting a new initiative for the city, from solving the city’s budget crisis to working on bringing cheaper grocery stores to certain boroughs. While he sometimes wanders into topics that don’t seem to make sense to me (e.g., the Koh-i-noor diamond debate) and while some of his goals may not be achievable (e.g., taxing the rich), I am impressed by his drive and his ambition.

I’m also particularly impressed by his communication skills. This interview he did with the New York Times is like a masterclass on how to handle difficult questions. I’ve seen him do this not just with people from the Times but other interviewers as well.

As for the Times, they don’t seem to know what to do with him, is my general thought. Going through this list of articles and op-eds about him in that paper, you get the sense that at best, they are highly doubtful of him. Let’s see how that relationship evolves.

Making do: affordability is a big topic not only in Mamdani’s New York but everywhere. The Times has a good series on how people with every day jobs somehow are making do in the Big Apple. The stories range from a family of 3 living on $500,000 on the Upper West Side to another family of 3 living off $25,000 in Queens. Quite the range financially and geographically.

Minimal living: speaking of affordable, visitors can always stay at these $100 hotels in New York City. Do you want to is the next question.

Maximal living: is this place affordable? No. Is it worth a look? As a fan of maximalism, I’d say yes.

Museum Living: not affordable or maximal is the Manhattan apartment of David Sedaris. In some ways it’s like seeing a museum or a nice art gallery. We should all take up humorous writing and live so well. 🙂
 

Martinis: if you are in New York and you’re looking for a place to get a New York happy meal, here are 13 essential spots according to Wallpaper*. And what is a New York happy meal, you might ask? Well according to the article: it consists of “an ice-cold martini and piping-hot French fries”. Sounds great to me.

Meals at 3 a.m.: I worried during the pandemic that New York might be backing away from being a place that never sleeps.That you might not be able to grab a bite at 3 a.m. like you once could. Well I worried for nothing. According to this piece by, there are still great places you can eat 24 hours a day. (And if want to know of more places to hit up, you’ll want to check out Fortney’s other pieces.)

The Metropolitan Opera: tough times for opera fans in New York (and those like me who come to the city on occasion to see opera, as New York’s Met Opera recently announces ‘necessary’ layoffs and pay cuts.

Massive: when I think of “massive” and “New York” last year, two things come to mind:

 

A mouse, a house, and an inflatable chair (what I am interested in when it comes to design and interior design, 2026)

Thanks to the good folks at Yanko Design (and some others), I’ve pulled together a list of interesting links over the last year that touch on the topic of design (e.g., smart phones) and interior design (e.g. chairs).

Devices: Let me start off with devices. Some IT based, some not….

IKEA: Ikea is continually doing interesting work, year after year. I think these links show that:
Furniture: IKEA is not the only furniture maker with well designed furniture. For example…
Living Space: finally…

Three quick thoughts on the new minimalism vs maximalism debate

It looks like minimalism has had it’s time and now it’s time for maximalism to take over. At least that’s the sense I get, reading this:More Is More: The End of Minimalism | The Walrus

My thoughts are this:

  1. Home decor is fashion, as much as clothing is fashion. The fashion for a time has been minimalism. Minimalism not just in having less items in your homes. It’s has also been about the colour of people’s walls. Or the use of mid-century modern furniture with its clean lines. The fashion of minimalism has always been about paring back in all areas of home decor.
  2. Now that form of minimalism is slowly going out of fashion. Home decor may be fashion, and no it doesn’t change as frequently as fashion in clothing, but yes it still changes. And the direction it is going to change towards is maximalism.
  3. I suspect we will see more and more maximalism in the next few years. Especially so as we eventually exit the pandemic. Things will get more colourful. Bolder lines and styles. Bigger pieces. More of everything. (Just like what you see in the photo above.) That will continue to increase until it too goes out of fashion. It’s all a pendulum.

For more on maximalism, here’s some other pieces I wrote. I also wrote more on minimalism too. 🙂

(Image via vinterior.co …I love it)

A masterwork of maximalism

Is this home featured here: This Cozy Minnesota Home Will Make You Want a Candelabra | A Cup of Jo

You really out to go to the site and check it out. Meanwhile, here’s a peek to show you what I mean:

Some thoughts on this:

  • There is a ton of objects in this photo, but they are orderly. There is a place for everything; things aren’t just thrown about.
  • The objects are all attractive: nothing is just stuck somewhere.
  • It helps to be in a nice room, but the good thing about maximalism is that you can turn even a boring box in to something attractive. (Much harder to do with minimalism
  • The colour scheme is consistent here. That helps rest the eye as it moves around the room.

I highly recommend you go to Cup of Jo linked to above and see the rest of it. It’s inspiring for maximalists like myself. 🙂

A good maximalist apartment


For fans of maximalism, you can get some good ideas on how to pull it off and still make your place feel orderly by checking out this post: A Book-Filled Manhattan Apartment Where Everything Tells a Story | A Cup of Jo.

If you love small spaces AND stuff, you need to learn to be a good maximalist. (Or buy storage.) That post in A Cup of Jo can help.

A few thoughts on Marie Kondo

Marie Kondo and her method of cleaning up are very hot now, likely due to her TV show. This hotness sparked a number of discussions about her, such as this: “Tokimeku” Means So Much More Than “Spark Joy” in Japanese | Apartment Therapy. It also sparked other, more extreme discussions, such as how it is racist to not account for the deeper Shinto meaning in her works.

I read her book when it first came out and I admired it. I didn’t agree with all of it, but I liked her approach to life and the things we own. I got the Shinto aspect of the book, but I don’t recall that  it was emphasized, so criticizing people of missing that who are unaware of Shintoism is a ridiculous criticism.

There have been shows like Marie Kondo on before. It makes sense. We are driven in North American culture to accumulate, and shows like hers provide us with an antidote to this. When Marie Kondo is forgotten, another home organizer will come along.

I have read more extreme versions of Marie Kondo, like “Goodbye, Things”, which promotes a very minimal life style. I bought it the way I buy other books that have subjects to aspire to but will never achieve. I guess others have too.

There is something to be said for a minimalist lifestyle, a maximalist life style, and something in between. In the end, what counts is that you have positive feelings towards the place you inhabit, however much you have.

One thing Marie Kondo misses is the notion of a room as a workshop. If you have a hobby, be it cooking or woodworking or gardening or reading, you likely have a room where all your tools and supplies are. If you are good at your hobby, you likely have alot of them. That makes sense. It doesn’t make sense to get rid of them just because you want to have less things. Have what you need to do the job when you want to. You could still trim back: do you really need 10 cutting boards or 3 screwdrivers that are exactly the same? But otherwise keep the tools you need or may need.

I think Marie Kondo is great because she encourages us to live better with some simple guidelines. Even if you don’t follow them all, you will live better if you consider her message and try to apply it. In the end you’ll have a better home, and you will have a better idea of what you consider a better home.

Image from the NYTimes article on her, here.

 

In praise of maximalism in decor

It’s rare to see a maximalist approach to decorating, but an exception is to be found here: House Tour: A Maximalist Apartment in Vicenza, Italy | Apartment Therapy.

If you are a fan of maximalism, like I tend to be, then this is exciting. If you are a minimalist, then this likely caused you some discomfort! 🙂 To each their own.

For those with the motto: More is More, click on the link for more ideas of how to fill up your space with beauty and the things you love. Minimalists will want to move on (unless they want to hate read it).