Who else read this cool article on Apartment Therapy?
“The New Prettiness”: The Resurgence of Traditional Femininity in Decor
Is it possible to agree with both opinions? It makes sense to me that the increasingly complex society/economy/politics of our time makes us nostalgic for when things were more defined and expectations were clear. I’m not saying we actually want to go back to those times (that would be horribly ignorant) but how often do we talk about the information age changing how children are being raised, friends relate to one another, and how people read, write, and even think?
To my mind, women in the past have often had to choose between being the traditional, pretty woman and the modern, hard-edged female, but the New Prettiness has a new attitude that goes along with it: we can indulge in soft, gentle decor as much as we’d like without sacrificing our boldness or originality. This means that, aesthetically, I can be feminine in a traditional way without fitting all the old stereotypes that used to accompany it. Perhaps the New Prettiness isn’t so much an escape from creating new female identities as an assertion that a woman doesn’t have to choose a single feminine identity anymore.
