Bookmarked: Bloomingdales Book of Home Decorating

We stumbled upon this bible of style from 1976 at the Santa Monica Library. Some of it seemed right on for right now (like the Frank Gehry cardboard furniture) and some, as expected, was a little...extreme...

Is this too pink, or just pink enough?

The 70's were a great time for extremes--was it the drugs? Was is PTSD? Was it fun? And this cave living room is no exception. Perhaps inspired by the Matterhorn, we're curious where the abominable snowman sleeps....

We do love the classic camponibili set-up. This is an example where more is more. That red gloss is so 70's we're loving it!

Frank Gehry would be proud to have one of the only designs in the book that have held up for 30 years...

Looks like even Bloomingdales got into the swing of things in the 70's and wasn't afraid to take some risks. Would you incorporate any of these ideas into your living space now? Seen anything like it in current magazines?

Comments (7)

Whoa, this is great. Reminds me of James Lileks' Interior Desecrators book:

http://lileks.com/institute/interiors/index.html

and also from his site:
http://lileks.com/institute/motel/index.html

posted by Leela on March 21st 2008 at 11:56am
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Great links Leela!

And I kind of like that cave room...

posted by f.in.eur on March 22nd 2008 at 1:38am
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does the book offer resources or names of furniture? some of those chairs and sofas (particularly the purple togo-like sofas and the candy red inflatables) look incredible

posted by the7000club.net on March 22nd 2008 at 10:00am
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I would love to hang out in that cave room!

posted by KetchupFiend on February 24th 2009 at 10:39am
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Leela loved the links too. The comments cracked me up. KetchupFiend, the cave room reminds me of one of the many rooms at the House on the Rock.

http://www.pbase.com/ysic/image/35136260

posted by English Accent on February 24th 2009 at 11:11am
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wonderful!!!

posted by scarlett1313 on February 24th 2009 at 11:40am
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I love this book. It's one of the books I refer to for ideas a lot. I have a big collection of vintage decorating books - one of my favorites is Decoration USA from 1965. Maxwell - let me know if you want to leaf through the library sometime!

posted by Brini Maxwell on February 24th 2009 at 12:25pm
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