Opinion

To the Window… To the Wall: Why Modern Interior Design Sucks Today

John Jajeh

17 Feb 2025 — 5 min read

IKEA - Atlantic Station Location. Photograph taken with Fujifilm Instax Square SQ6. Credit: John Jajeh

Okay, I admit that the title of this article makes me sound like an old man shaking his fist at a cloud (while listening to Lil Jon), but hear me out.

Modern interior design, which I'll appropriately refer to as MID, is defined by qualities like open floor plans, monochromatic color schemes, overemphasis on raw materials, over-reliance on straight lines, and a "form as a consequence of function" approach to furniture.

In this article, I will discuss my suspicions about the reasoning behind each aforementioned quality as well as my thoughts about the cultural ramifications or perversions of each.

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