THE NEW TRADITIONAL VALUES
September 23, 2016
But, it’s a breath-of-fresh-air NEW Traditional, all at once familiar and unlike anything you’ve seen before. Today’s most forward designers are taking time-tested familiar furniture silhouettes and reinventing them with new materials, finishes and a wonderful sense of whimsy.
Take pied-de-biche, for example. Traditional table leg design often culminates with a foot shaped like an animal hoof. Think claw and ball! If this design feature sounds a bit old fashioned, you don’t know Oly Studio. Check out the Ari Side Table: three tripod legs are shaped like animal limbs right down to the hoof. It’s traditional upended – with a wink and a smile!
Classic design references are a signature of New Traditional. From Oly Studio. Available at Robb & Stucky.
How many of us have sat down to dinner at a traditional trestle table? This style is loaded with legacy. Century furniture has designed a New Traditional farmhouse table that would be perfectly at home in a penthouse. The gorgeous, highly figured sable-finished tabletop is set on a metal trestle base, polished to a gleaming silver glow. It’s yesterday, it’s today, it’s New Traditional.
Mixed materials – metal and wood – make this Century table a New Traditional classic. Available at Robb & Stucky.
Your grandmother probably had a tufted sofa. Mine did. Tufting is a traditional upholstery technique, and it’s moved from the living room to the bedroom. Just ask the traditional-modernist Candace Olson.
I like to imagine Candice at the drawing board with carte blanche to design whatever her heart desires. With all options open, Candice Olson created a tufted bed. She calls it Temptress. The high headboard and low footboard are framed in wood and finished with tufted upholstery panels. Candice and manufacturing partner Highland House are the masters of using old-school craftsmanship in a fresh, surprising ways, a hallmark of New Traditional.
Candice Olson’s bed for Highland House is classic New Traditional styling. Available at Robb & Stucky.
The world keeps moving faster and faster. Design trends seem to cycle with the seasons. Blink and you’re yesterday. How do you find decorating equilibrium? New Traditional all the way. It looks backward and forward, creating an ideal decorating balance for today.
ABOUT MARK STUART: Robb & Stucky Creative Director Mark Stuart is responsible for the floor plan and visual display of all Robb & Stucky stores. In his spare time, he also shops the world for accessories and engages with our amazing buying team to ensure Robb & Stucky stores enchant as a unified, beautiful experience.
