Being alternative is more than just a look — it’s a style that evolves with you. One of the biggest mistakes people make is treating alternative style like a fixed category. Punk, goth, grunge, cyber, and minimalist-dark are really just starting points, not final destinations. When you treat them like uniforms, it can feel more like wearing a costume than expressing who you are. True mastery happens when you stop asking what fits the label and start choosing what feels natural, personal, and inevitable on your body — the moment your style becomes unmistakably your own. Continue reading Mastering an Alternative Style→
Portable, revolving book stands, like this one made of ebonized cherry and paper, (1875) allowed owners to have books, perhaps even the latest home decorating manuals, easily accessible in the parlor or drawing room. The paper panels that enrich these stands — with pointed quatrefoils on one and a variety of medieval-style musicians on the other — are based on ceramic tiles designed by the prominent British firm Minton and Company.
Over the course of their nearly twenty-year partnership, Anton Kimbel (1822–1895) and Joseph Cabus (1824–1898) developed one of New York City’s leading furniture and decorating firms. Sons of German and French cabinetmaking families, they defined a new take on Modern Gothic design, a style that originated in Britain and was embraced by a growing middle class in the post–Civil War United States.
This visually arresting, deep-teal hued Gothic sofa by Kimbel and Cabus (circa 1875) presents a paradox. The angled arms and legs meet to suggest adjustability or flexibility, but the strong mortise-and-tenon joints that secure the legs and rails render motion impossible.
Though Edward Godwin initially worked in the Gothic Revival style, beginning in the 1860s he was increasingly influenced by the culture of Japan; collecting Japanese art and studying that country’s architecture and furnishings in ukiyo-e prints and Western publications. Inspired by such sources and frustrated with the commercial furniture then available, Godwin created spare designs such as this Sideboard in which the structural supports are the dominant, decorative element. The work’s primary aesthetic is achieved, as Godwin said, “by the mere grouping of solid and void.” Godwin made the first version of this sideboard for his own home in 1867.
