"In the matter of furnishing, I find a certain absence of ugliness, far worse than ugliness… "
So said Sidonie Gabrielle Colette and I couldn’t have put it better myself. Ugliness matters. You need it to juxtapose the beauty you authentically seek. It matters because without ugliness, there is no beauty. It matters because on its own, beauty can be bland, because there is nothing quite as dull as perfection and those who seek it, those who cannot except flaws, tend to be the dullest of characters.
I positively embrace ugliness. People tell me that my collection of naive portraits of children are scarily ugly, that my favorite colour, olive green is foul, and that they can’t imagine what drew me to Mark….
Got anything ugly in your house?
Ugly? So funny to be asked that! I have a small collection of chalk dogs that were my grandmother's and my husband tends to like to tease about them. They stay though!
And one of my favorite colors is chartreuse…had a china cabinet in the kitchen painted that until recently, and took ribbing for that too!
I love old ugly furniture. We find it cast off by others or on sale for next to nothing and I always have the thought that I will refinish it. Until it comes into our home and we get used to it's quirky ugliness! Like the wonderful olive and gold striped velvet chair which I ADORE and was found next to the curb on trash day because someone else thought it so ugly and old. It has a wonderful springy seat that bounces you right up to yor feet when you are ready to get out of it- I will never get rid of it! But I am sure that my family secretly discusses my horrid taste after they have been made to sit around looking at and sitting in my wonderfully ugly furniture…
Alison, I have a favorite painting from a childhood friend that I like to display prominently. It's far from a work of art, but it has a true sentimental value for me… however for others it's just ugly.