५ मे, २०२३

Does your floor have a soul?

I'm reading "Gray Floors Elicit Visceral Reactions. So Why Are They Seemingly Everywhere? Fueled by social media, a hatred for trendy gray flooring is thriving. But for many people, living with gray floors isn’t a choice" (NYT).
Lucía Massucco, a 28-year-old artist, is no fan of the flooring. “It’s impossible to have a warm, cozy ambience with them,” said Ms. Massucco. “They have a very soul-deprived and clinical feeling.”.... 
Claire Lower, a 36-year-old editor at Lifehacker, a blog for life hacks, bought her Portland, Ore., home, which came with gray floors, in 2020. She called the floors “soulless” and “corporate neutral,” but noted that they were, at least, easy to clean....

Do you think people are unconsciously relating "soul" to "soil"? Do your intimate inanimate objects seem imbued with "soul"? Should they? What would cause that perception? It's perception only, an association with something that you think or would like to think is part of the human being. Is the perceived soullessness of your floors a sign that you feel as though you have lost — or never had — a soul? Is it that gray floors are a trend, so when you see your own gray floors, you're seeing yourself as a mere follower of crowds, a minuscule fiber caught up in a drifting dust bunny? But what can you do? You're only catching up to the decline of the gray floor trend. To fight the gray is to follow the crowd, you lost soul, you.

३७ टिप्पण्या:

Ron Winkleheimer म्हणाले...

You're the person with the degree in art history, but when I hear someone say an inanimate object or room or whatever lacks soul I don't think they are venturing into the meta-physical realm but are trying to convey "the quality that arouses emotion and sentiment." (Webster's)

tim maguire म्हणाले...

I think it's related to art. Good art gives you an emotional reaction. The art becomes credited with the feelings it evokes. The masters imbue their work with soul; things that are bland, unimaginative, unmoving, clinical are described as soulless.

So it's partly about you, but mostly about the person who created it. The creation becomes a stand-in for the creator.

Kate म्हणाले...

Grey/silver cars are the same: ubiquitous. They have no color, no personality . . . no soul. Obviously, they also sell the best precisely because they are bland. Not everyone wants red or purple or yellow, but everyone is willing to buy grey.

For the people in the article, get an area rug. Instant soul.

gahrie म्हणाले...

Who cares, if the Left wins, we're all going back to packed earth anyway.

fairmarketvalue म्हणाले...

While I have no idea where Ms. Massucco lives, I note that Ms. Lower lives in Portlandia. 'Nuff said. "Soulless" indeed.

Pro tip: don't buy a house with "soulless" flooring, or, having purchased said home, replace the soulless flooring with "soulfull" flooring. Shag carpet, anyone?

Narr म्हणाले...

Define 'gray.' I always envision my little bottle of Testers Battleship Grey.

We replaced a horrid dark faux brick kitchen floor (original mid-50s) with some grey-greenish faux planking in '16 or so, and it fits well with the new countertops AND the old copper and wood cabinetry.

Personally I find gray flooring less off-putting than the shades of gray in every other aspect of home and office decor that has been predominant in the last decade or so.

phantommut म्हणाले...

Have these people never heard of rugs?

Joe Smith म्हणाले...

No. But my shoes do.

Gray is everywhere.

Wood floors are the best floors.

Natural stone or tile is second best.

Either can be 'softened' with area rugs.

Narr म्हणाले...

Oh yeah, define 'soul.'

As I get older I'm drawn increasingly to Primitive Animism.

Scott Patton म्हणाले...

Discovering that floors have souls would be terrifying. And oddly enough, discovering that a particular floor has a soul would be even more terrifying. But if all floors shared the same soul it would be mildly amusing.

vermonter म्हणाले...

It appears that the NYT has more paper and ink than actual news.

n.n म्हणाले...

My floor has soul with jazz on vinyl.

Jupiter म्हणाले...

If she bought a house in Portland, gray floors are the least of her troubles.

frose म्हणाले...

In an Instagram post that has garnered nearly 170,000 likes, designer Bilal Rehman said that gray flooring “sucks the life out of any space that you have.”

"garnered" !

Mike (MJB Wolf) म्हणाले...

Does the NYT admit that people have souls?

re Pete म्हणाले...

"All these people that you mention

Yes, I know them, they’re quite lame"

n.n म्हणाले...

A novel classification, a twilight faith, a pro-choice religion, where there is conflation of floor and covering.

PM म्हणाले...

A floor has many soles.

n.n म्हणाले...

Only my roof: deck, underlayment, shingles knows.

Crimso म्हणाले...

I know my floor has soul. That's why I named it "Richard Nixon."

Mary Beth म्हणाले...

No, but my shoes do.

mongo म्हणाले...

Kate said, “ Grey/silver cars are the same: ubiquitous. They have no color, no personality . . . no soul. Obviously, they also sell the best precisely because they are bland. Not everyone wants red or purple or yellow, but everyone is willing to buy grey.”

Regardless of their politics, people get more conservative as they spend more money on anything. Hence gray, silver, black, or white for cars. Maybe this explains grey floors, as the house is usually the thing most people spend the most money on.

selfanalyst म्हणाले...

Thomas Sowell, "There are no solutions, only tradeoffs".

For God's sake, "I don't like gray, but it is what I could afford, or was in my chosen neighborhood, etc. etc. etc", is enough of an explanation.

Grow the Hell Up, quit turning everything in your life into something "meaningful".

Guess what, losing 4 important people in my life in 2020 to cancer or addiction was soul less also, but I could not fix it with an area rug.

boatbuilder म्हणाले...

It's a floor, for chrissakes. You don't like it, put a rug on it.

Or maybe lift up your gaze to...I dunno, the walls or windows.

Sheridan म्हणाले...

How about toilets? Do they have souls? They are the Helots of the household. They go about their business without complaint and are willing to eat shit at anytime. Sometimes they rebel but if that keeps up they are easily replaced.

Narr म्हणाले...

Does your soul have a floor?

mikee म्हणाले...

Gimme that avocado green shag carpet again, from the early 1970s!
Sure, it caused rugburn in sensitive spots when rollicking naked with friends, but it was both full of soul AND ungodly amounts of filth if not vacuum-shampooed regularly.

SteveWe म्हणाले...

I think people don't like gray floors because they don't have any warmth -- with "soul" being their word for warmth.

wild chicken म्हणाले...

Grey vinyl plank, preferred by flippers everywhere.

No longer a trend I hope.

Hassayamper म्हणाले...

I'm so sick of home decor trends. I'm building a new house and wife insists on gray floors. Bet you anything once she learns they are falling out of fashion, she'll want a change order. Last house we built I spent tens of thousands on luscious cherry wood cabinetry, and within two or three years I was informed that dark wood is only for poor white trash and we had to paint them all white to stay on trend.

Butkus51 म्हणाले...

grays are the independents in the color spectrum



Gospace म्हणाले...

Spent too many years haze gray and underway to like gray for house interiors.

Big Mike म्हणाले...

I don’t see how one can generalize about a color that has at least fifty shades.

typingtalker म्हणाले...

More people who don't have enough to worry about -- and a "news" "paper" that doesn't have enough to write about.

Rusty म्हणाले...

No. B ut my patio rocks.

loudogblog म्हणाले...

Once, they moved our shop to the next room over. Before the move, my boss came over and asked what color we wanted the new space painted before we moved in. I said, "Any color but gray." When we came next week to do the move the new space had been painted grey. He also wouldn't let us decorate the walls because he didn't want it to "look like a dorm room."

Linda Fox म्हणाले...

How silly!
You OWN the house - put down some colorful rugs.
Problem solved.