Raquel Welch, who should know, once said sexiness is 50 percent what you’ve got and 50 percent what people think you’ve got. I think about that quote when designing my home. Not the sexiness part, but the reality versus illusion part. How much is authentic, and how much is strictly a front.
Take the stone veneer going in our basement bar area. The veneer gives the rocky impression that the room was built back in the 1700s, when walls and arches truly were built of solid stone. Our walls are fake stone cemented to plywood, a façade no deeper than a stage set, or the moral fiber of a Ferrari owner.
Years ago, I wouldn’t have settled for such fraud. I was a house snob. Remember the days of DINKs? Double Income No Kids? Well, that was Dan and I. Now we’re Double Kids No Income, and I can’t afford to be a house snob. Plus, I paid a lot for real stuff only to later regret not buying the good imitation.
Our first home was a 1936 California bungalow, which we rebuilt. The architect specified redwood siding. We could buy Masonite – a wood lookalike – for much less. Back then the cost difference was $14,000: The price for real wood was $21,000 versus $7,000 for the imitation, which never needs painting. I insisted on the real stuff. Although I briefly enjoyed knowing our house wasn’t a pretender, in the end – as Dan often reminds me – we didn’t get any more money when we sold the house because we sprung for the higher quality stuff. Ouch! So my purist phase ended.
In our next home, the builder installed a plain living room fireplace of white pre-cast plaster. Eventually, we felt the fireplace needed more character. Our choices were to tear it out and replace it, which would be messy and expensive; live with it; or have it faux finished. Faux finishing is when a painter so thoroughly transforms a plain surface that onlookers gasp, slap their foreheads and immediately repent all former drug use.
I had just met an artist who could paint a car to look like a block of Swiss cheese. We gave him a square of Emperador marble, dark brown with ivory veins. He replicated it perfectly onto the fireplace. A real marble fireplace would have cost $12,000. The paint job cost $2,000.
Since trading purism for pragmatism, fakery doesn’t bug me anymore. Here’s my rationale: I’m never going to live in an authentic restored 17th Century European chateau, with genuine stone walls, solid marble fireplaces, structurally necessary exposed beams, an easy commute to Nordstrom and good schools. So I’d better pretend. I figure if faking it is good enough for the glamorous Ms. Welch, it’s good enough for me.
Marni Jameson is a nationally syndicated columnist who lives in the Denver area. You may contact her through marnijameson.com.
Places where going faux is just fine
Here are some other areas in home design where Marni Jameson happily accepts fake:
Fireplace logs. I used to insist on real wood, but now I’m a gas-log girl. I do miss the smell and crackle of real wood, but I don’t miss playing Cinderella when cleaning the ashes. Plus gas logs burn cleaner so are better for the environment.
Wood beams. Some purists will say, don’t put a beam in a house unless it’s structural. Phooey. I side with many designers who put fake beams in ceilings to cast a rustic or old-world spell.
Water features. Years ago I turned my nose up at yards with manmade creeks and falls. Well, today, I have a manmade water feature in my backyard. I love to sit on the deck, listen to the water burble over the rocks and see the goldfish.
Flowers. While nothing beats fresh flowers, today my home has several convincing silk plants and flowers arrangements, which don’t die and don’t leave water rings.
Leather and suede. When a designer first showed me a fabric that looked exactly like suede but wasn’t, then squirted it with household cleaner to remove a food stain, I was sold.
