The Well Balanced Plate – Tofu Steak, Edamame and Brown Rice
Posted: January 13th, 2012 | Author: artintolife | Filed under: design, other stuff | Tags: art, artists, ceramics, crafts, design, drawings, economy, home, humor, mass market, redecorating, shopping, tableware
There’s a trend now in tableware to offer plain, white, ceramic dishes and serving plates with delicately drawn words or illustrations on them which look almost like pen and ink drawings. Three or four years ago, and more than that, it was melamine. All about melamine: kid friendly, indestructible, cheap, but good-looking.
So I’m going to throw out a hypothesis. When everyone was in the money, we were all about amassing things. Quantity was primary. Lots of nice and cheerful stuff. Hence melamine. Obviously I could verify this with retail statistics, but that would require a hell of a lot of time, so I’m just going to speculate that as we find ourselves deeper in the recession, there is a renewed desire among consumers to buy fewer, but nicer things. You can just get a couple of things, but they should be of quality. Not expensive mind you. We want quality goods for bargain basement prices. Of course, the market delivered. Chicken and egg thing as far as I’m concerned about which came first, the desire or the flash sale websites. But come they did and started to change the face of retail.
