As I reported last year, the big trend to watch for was what I called WPA DECO. This year the trend continues but has morphed into a more sophisticated version of DECO which I am calling SARTORIAL SERVITUDE. Along with AUSTERE LUXURY – REVISITING THE 1990s this trend is the largest.
With the continuation of economic uncertainty and the prospect of large government job programs and incentives, the somber style of the 1920s and 1930s work programs fit our moment. Rich muted colors and dust bowl pastels mix to recall the depressed but faintly glamorous civic era. Structured work clothes will inspire tailored soft furnishings in suiting fabrics and textures.
Here are the important bullet points for this trend:
Clean traditional lines
- Rich muted color
- Dust bowl pastels
- Simple furnishings on a more grand scale
- Practical textured fabrics
- Tailored soft furnishings
- Suiting fabrics used in home decor
- Worn Leather used in home decor
Most important colors for this trend:
- The two palettes of either Rich Muted Tones or the palette of dust bowl pastels
- men’s tailoring fabrics or worn leather used for home decor
Here are several examples that best exemplify the trend:
Shown above a room that used Deco heavily as inspiration while employing what I call the dust bowl pastel palette. My own created room example used as the main banner above is using the other important palette of the rich muted somber tones.
Here is the look in fashion. This beautiful dress worn by Gwyneth Paltrow is in a nude color that falls into the the dust bowl pastels.
Here a set of pillows in the dust bowl pastels.
The mosaics above show a medium version of the palette halfway between the dust bowl pastels and the rich muted palette.
A close-up of natural stone showing the palette. Stone in all it’s forms is one of the most important materials for this trend. The interesting thing about these two trends AUSTERE LUXURY and SARTORIAL SERVITUDE is how much overlap there is between them. Since this trend is mostly about materials and palette it can easily be used in AUSTERE LUXURY.
This magazine tear could have been used for AUSTERE LUXURY but the dust bowl colors also worked well for this trend. Notice the grey and camel trend works within SARTORIAL SERVITUDE’S palettes.
Suiting fabrics in the medium color palette.
I thought this tear from House Beautiful was a great example of the many textures that come with this new trend. But notice they are all in the same palette. Stone is still the center of attention.
Like AUSTERE LUXURY this trend uses tone on texture.
Pattern is worn and aged looking.
Finally here is the muted dark somber palette. These are fabric swatches that again draw inspiration from men’s suiting fabrics.
Here is a period deco vase from our dealer TOJ Gallery that shows the use of the medium and some of the dark rich palette.
This is a comptemporary rug using the rich muted palette. I like the mix of warm and cools here.
Here it is in men’s fashion.
And in high end sink for a bathroom. This one even has deco like lines and shapes.
