How The Other 0.0000001% Lives
Written: Apr 21 '00 (Updated Apr 27 '00)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: It humbles you.
Cons: It humbles you.
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| ATOM's Full Review: Wallpaper* Magazine |
My good friend Super Don Ban, who is a graphic design God (one of Print magazine's Top 20 Graphic Designers under 30 in 1999), introduced me to Wallpaper*. Super Don Ban lives the life portrayed in this magazine. Whereas I add furniture to my apartment through donations from roommates who don't want to lug it to their new flat when they move, Super Don Ban is about to take the next Concorde to Osaka, Japan because the SoHo corner furniture store doesn't have the right coffee table to go with his Phillipe Starck couch and he doesn't want to wait for the store to get it in stock. Wallpaper* is not the magazine for how the rest of us live; it is the magazine for how none of us live.
It's the perfect name, Wallpaper*, because that's what the articles make you feel like. Reading them talk about all the hip little cafes, restaurants, shops, and bars where they check credit card limits instead of IDs for access, you feel like you're at a Junior High School party stuck to the wall like velcro, worried if people aren't coming by to talk with you because you don't live in the right neighborhood. Or you begin to look at the couch your grandfather re-upholstered for you in deep shag and wonder if going out and maxing your credit card for the seriously suede-d loveseat by the latest obscure Danish design firm will mean your hip Dotcom neighbors might actually come over to sit in it. Be careful, Wallpaper* will bring you back to therapy.
My advice, read Wallpaper* like the pornography it is. Just look at the pretty pictures. The furniture, architecture, clothing, knickknacks and funky locales are all beautiful. This magazine, with the weight of a Sears catalogue [Oh, won't they ever hate that reference; OK, let's say the weight of, oh, an Ikea catalogue then], chronicles some of the hippest designs out there. If it's the latest ingenious adaptation of the can-opener prototype or a chair designed to look non-functional when it actually cradles your tender lower back like a new born child, this magazine will show it to you. They illustrate that beautiful design doesn't just stop with furniture. It continues on in clothing, architecture, even menus, each issue featuring the latest in culinary creativity, from the taste of the food to the look. Wallpaper* shows that gorgeous design work is being done everywhere, from the first class seats on an airline you could never afford, to the sugar dispenser that just might be in your price range.
Even I went out and bought a Phillipe Starck Excalibur toilet scrubber to spice up my Goodwill-accessorized bathroom. Now that purchase is really raising the manicured eyebrows of my IPO-ed instantnaire nextdoor neighbors. They invited me to their blue-themed party next week where they're flying in Dorfmeister to spin and Puck to cater. I think I'll wear my blue parachute pants. Are those still cool? Let me flip through Wallpaper* to make sure.
[Disclaimer: I do NOT want to give the impression that Super Don Ban is in anyway like the pretentious people described in the pages of this magazine. Super Don Ban is one of the most respectful, thoughtful, kind, sweet, and non-condescending guys I know. He simply has hella talent and all the advertising and design firms know that. Peace.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
ATOM
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Member: Adam H.
Location: San Francisco, CA
Reviews written: 44
Trusted by: 105 members
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