Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Vegas Carpet: Surreal, Intense and Addictive?

Wired: Ugly Vegas Carpets Want You to Keep Playing
What's your opinion of Las Vegas Casino carpet? Love it? Hate it? Tolerate it as a necessary evil? Is it too intense, somewhat surreal while also addictive?

This Wired magazine article builds on a related story in The New Yorker [see The Carpets of Vegas: Floorscapes at the Casino].  Titled Ugly Vegas Carpets Want You to Keep Playing, it, too, brings up Chris Maluszynski's Las Vegas Carpets photographic series.

In the article and the series, you'll experience the surreal quality of both carpet and Las Vegas. Where else but in Las Vegas can such intensely exuberant and patterned carpet be more appropriate? Where else can it support addictive activity?

I love the points made by Dave Schwartz, Director of the Center for Gaming Research, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas.

He states that “casino carpet is known as an exercise in deliberate bad taste that somehow encourages people to gamble.”  Talk about addictive!

At the same time, each carpet design distinctly defines individual casinos.  Per the article, "Schwartz also points out that the busy carpets are not without design: There are floral designs at Mandalay Palace, abstract pointillist floors at Paris and, at Caesars Palace, the wheel – the Roman symbol of the “relentless capriciousness of fortune.”" [See Empty Pockets, Happy Feet & Casino Carpet.]

For me, prolonged exposure to the visual intensity [and energy] of the various bold and colorful patterns creates sensory overload. That's when I seek refuge in my hotel room where if I'm lucky, as you can see in Wow! Mirage Carpet, a tastefully subdued design scheme will definitely offer a well-deserved break!

What's your take on Las Vegas carpet? Do you have a preferred Casino pattern? Let me know!

A few additional casino-related carpet posts:
+ NY-NY Casino Abandons Branded Carpet
+ Way-Finding With Carpet

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

New Carpet Style Trends from CarpetRight

New Carpet Style Trends from CarpetRight
If you remember from Carpetright Style Guide: Carpet Inspiration Online, Carpetright in the UK offers carpet design and style inspiration via online trends and monthly tips.  These are created by Victoria Redshaw and have recently been updated with new carpet style trends!

More specifically, when you next visit the Carpetright Style guide, you'll find details on the 3 following new trends:

* Jubilant Indigo

* Country Ideals

* Grand Bazaar

What I love most about how Victoria presents these carpet style trends is that she suggests how to get the look, create interesting design groupings, then complete the look with carpet recommendations.

As I read through each trend, I find myself thinking how I might go about creating that trend...

In addition to the style guide trends, you'll find two new interior design tips since my last post, both extremely practical and relevant:  How to make a small room look bigger and Simple Rules for Selecting Colours.

I invite you to go explore.  Then, will you let me know which carpet style trend you find most appealing and which interior design tip most valuable?

Thanks for reading!

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