What does your apartment say to the date you bring home? Is it a date magnet or a liability? Being that it is totally your domain and your most intimate space, you have to imagine that it will have a pretty good influence on what your date thinks about you, regardless of how hot you are. Here at the AT Labs, we've been thinking about this subject deeply and have come up with a few theories...
1. The Nurturing Apartment
If your apartment is comfortable, clean and physically well taken care of, this is a sign of your nurturing and caretaking abilities.
Read: you would make a good mother, father or caretaker.
2. The Smart Apartment
If your apartment is organized and efficient with minimal clutter, this is a sign of your professional and intellectual abilities.
Read: you are or will be successful in your career and would make a smart partner.
3. The Seductive Apartment
If your apartment is beautifully decorated with an emphasis on color and drama, this is a sign of your passion and desire.
Read: you are a good lover and ready for bed.
Of course, the ultimate goal is to find balance on all three levels, but far too often we visit clients and we see one or two of these levels predominating and it sends a clear message to any potential suitor.
What does your apartment say?
For example, some apartments send the signal that they are looking for a great night out and they are all about passionate romance. They highlight the inhabitants passionate nature and highlight dramatic design. See Jaime's Date Ready Pad. His emphasis in his apartment is on seduction more than anything else.
Other apartments send the signal that they take their professional ambitions seriously and organize themselves around maximum efficiency. They highlight organization and a clean design. See Allison's Design to the Max. Her emphasis in this apartment is on the application of her design sense and the intelligent use of space.
Still other apartments send the signal that they are looking for a husband, wife or lifemate and they are all about taking good care of the home. They highlight family photos, cleanliness and design based on comfort. See Charles' Perfect Garden Apartment. His emphasis is on history, family and creating a warm, comfortable environment.
How can this work for you?
Take a good look at your apartment and see which it is. Is this the message you really want to broadcast? If not, then you might just want to roll up your sleeves and do a little work on your apartment this weekend to help bring about your most desired outcome....
Copyright © 2007 Apartment Therapy
Um, Maxwell, I think you left a word out of this post's subheading...
Thank you!
In my case, it's beware the leviathan. it will get you if you don't watch out.
It says "Yeah, baby! Let's have a shag!"
Actually, I am finally really happy about what my apartment says about me.* And the bed right by the door helps. ;)
* Well, not RIGHT now. Right now it is a mess. No comments, please. ;)
But, OY, Tom and Rita for "Nurturing"?!?!
Could have been worse... Tom and Katie!!
The "seductive" apartments would have me running for the door--either freaked out or doubled over with laughter. And I'm a freakin' ROMANCE NOVELIST, so if anyone should be succeptible, it's me. It strikes me as trying too hard and rather, well, sleazy. In a novel, it's the room I'd give the "mistake" boyfriend or the slimy guy who SEEMED really nice when the protagonist met him, but when she stopped by his apartment... Or, if I gave it to a woman, it would be a desperately unhappy person who hides behind an image of seduction so that no one can come within an emotional mile of her.
I much prefer apartments that are more honest reflections of a person's personality rather than apartments arranged around a theme (I'm a sex bomb!), effect (You want to do me, don't you?), or goal (Sex, baby!). I'm much more likely to like someone who isn't trying to...manipulate me.
Don't get me wrong--there are a number of elements that I really like in Jaime's date-ready pad. I like the colors during the day, the dining table, and the art. It's just that the overall feel carries a whiff of Barry Manilow, water beds, a mirror over the bed (with a crackled golden finish!), and animal print--updated for a younger generation.
I wouldn't put quite so much into other styles. Some people love a cottage-y or farmhouse look not because they want 2.4 kids and a dog but just because they like them. It might remind them of grandma's house or of summers in the country--or the summers in the country they never had. It certainly reflects SOMETHING about their personality, but I wouldn't go so far as to try to make a blanket personality assignment/style correlation--even with someone I've barely met. Similarly, plenty of non-career-oriented people simply like the peace and rythm of a minimalist space.
So if one's place is a mess, does that mean you're looking for a great night out, away from it?
What does a display of Three Stooges magnets say?
It's an interesting concept... but I wonder what it says about me that I find Allison's Design to the Max sexier than Jaime's Date-Ready Pad.
I know, I was like "Tom and Rita?"
Maybe Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, if we need to stick to celebs. Or Super-Nanny. :)
Here is a question: I am thinking about getting a murphy bed. How does one pull the bed down without ruining the mood? Is it possible to a a murphy bed and still have an apartment that says "do me"? I feel like Sarah Jessica Parker typing this crap.
I'll never forget one guy's comment:
"Oh, you're one of those neat ones."
Lydia wins the week's prize for best perspective on a theme!!
Lydia--
I am TOTALLY intrigued now to see what kind of character my apartment would make me in one of your books!!
Click my name for the link.
(suddenly regretting that invite to Lydia!!!)
Marilyn--
Depends on what they are holding up.
Two guys have told me my place is "cozy."
I must admit, I did not go on a second date one time with a guy whose apartment was REALLY atrocious. HE was totally cute, though. Bummer.
Jean, you devil, you!
Two guys at once? No wonder it was "cozy"!! ;)
I bet it was cozy.
I was recently told I have a "grown-up" place. I'm 24, is this a good thing?
And do girls really still expect to see carmen electra posters on the walls at this age?
I think if they said "grown up" it's a good thing. But that may mean they expect commitment!!! ;)
Walls, maybe.
Ceiling, no.
Avocado, I see two options:
1. Forget the bed. Go for the couch, chair, or floor. You can pull down the bed later for round 2.
2. Be like a magician. You'll need a distraction to take the emphasis away from what you are doing. Because you mention Sarah Jessica Parker I'm guessing you're a lady (sorry, I know I'm not PC). Flirtatious conversation should do that. If you need something more high-powered, there's always flashing some cleavage and bum during the murphy-ing. If you can set this to music then you're golden. A good looking woman moving to music can make disassembling a carburetor enthralling.
If you're a guy I'm not quite sure how to help you. With my wife I'd probably just toss her over my shoulder like a pillaging viking and then flip down the bed one-handed if possible. But we are freaks so I wouldn't try that method with your date unless you know for sure that would be appreciated!
Carmen's single again. Slap that baby back on the wall.
I too dumped someone when I saw her filthy pad. Ross Gellar did the same thing :)
Avocado--
If you're a guy like the guys *I* like, Max's advice works nicely, too. All of it. :)
Avocado,
Just use the couch or floor, do the cigarette thing, then both of you tenderly unfurl the bed.
Petepete -- "Grown-up" implies that a 24-year-old guy's place contains an extra roll of toilet paper, seating that is unlikely to pass on social diseases, and (indeed) no visible posters of semi-nude women (or Peanuts and Garfield characters). It may also include a minimum of two matching place settings, coordinating towels without holes, and a lack of laundry on the floor. All of these are good things.
If visitors say it reminds them of their dads' place, then you can worry.
like to think that I satisfy those conditions...
When I was giving my girlfriend the initial appt tour she saw my roomates room and said (albiet after a bottle of wine) "I hope that's not your room..." I don't know how to tell the guy that excessive clutter, carpentry gear, and old dirty baseball hats are not helping him out in this dept.....
I had a date ask if my book shelves were arranged in order by color. Unfortunately they are, so I think he picked up on my OCD. Damn.
Petepete, give your roomie(or buy for yourself and casually leave it about)a copy of Tom McNulty's "Clean Like a Man."
It's a great book - a guy's complete beginner household guide. Click my name for a link.
hm.
won't most people's apartments give off similar first impressions as their inhabitants? looking around my place with the eyes of an outsider, what i get is "fun and quirky". which is approximately how the people i date describe me. i would imagine that a 24 year old with Carmen Electra posters on the walls would be comparably immature. from your place, P2, i see someone who is confident, but not full of himself. it wouldn't surprise me if you came off that way in person, too.
I think my place doesn't reflects my sense of fun and quirkiness enough. It's kind of, oh, formal. My realtor was here recently for the first time after the move and kept telling us how "classy" everything is.
Maybe I should get out those X-Files action figures. I do have the alien on a gurney.
Avocado - pulling out the Murphy bed isn't that much of an interruption. During our first year of marriage, my husband and I shared a 10' x 12' studio (that includes the kitchen and bathroom) that would have been impossible to live in without the Murphy bed. Having to pull the Murphy bed out never was a problem for us. If anything, it's like another bit of foreplay - woohoo, here comes the bed!
the opoponax: Some people's apartments might reflect who they once used to be ... or who they aspire to be. Some people haven't put much thought into it and have taken in what people have given them ... family or otherwise. I've seen neat-as-a-pin women step over all kinds of crap on the floor to get out of their apartments ... and casual folks open the door to reveal jaw-dropping elegance.
On another note: years ago a friend told me my apartment was too tasteful and needed somethinfg tacky in it. She gave me a silly Puss-in-Boots cookie jar (which, ironically, is now one of the more valuable things I own!).
but doesn't that reflect the person? how can you be "neat as a pin" with a messy apartment? wouldn't a messy home make you, oh, i don't know, not really that neat at all? your home is a part of who you are. i imagine that not putting thought into one's home means something wrt that person's character. now obviously these things aren't entirely apparent, down to the "meaning" of the side table or the bathmat. but i usually get a sense of who a person is by seeing their home, and those impressions (whether "first" or not) are very rarely wrong. even if that home is messy, or unstyled, or disheveled. or, on the opposite end, if it is overstyled or very by-the-book. there's still a reason for that.
all that said, i wonder what my twin bed says about me...
Patrick--
Overall, I really enjoy your apt. *g* Especially the change from "before" to "after"! As for what kind of character I'd put there...
He could be either the female protag's brother, her good friend, or her love interest. It would depend of the story. A flexible, comfortable kind of character, though not without his edges. (If he was the female protag's friend or brother, he'd probably get his own story in a book or two!)
First, he'd be pretty serious (very straitlaced color choices) but would either have a sense of fun or would want to be seen like he has a sense of fun but secretly isn't entirely sure that he's a fun person (even though his uncertainties are unfounded, as people who knew him well would say). (That's why he not only has zebra stripes, which could EITHER be fun or from someone taking himself too seriously, but also the cow-patterned pillow, which shows that the zebra was meant playfully, after all--the tweed confirms it, too, as it would normally be very conservative but plays off the other black-and-white patterns.)
He would have decorated his apartment in one fell swoop--a kind of all-or-nothing person. When he decides to do something, there's be no half measures, or if there were, he'd feel awful about them. Many of the things seem to have been bought at the same time, especially the accessories, and though he knows what he likes (the museum-store-esque pieces), he's into instant gratification (from nothing to decorated in a month or two--everything coordinates because it was bought at the same time and often from the same place). This is why some of his choices are rather conventional--the grass-in-a-box in the bathroom, for example--but he didn't get them because he was deliberately trend chasing but because he saw it and liked it, and he wanted it to be nice and for other people to think it was nice (he *is* insecure enough for that), but he doesn't care whether he's super-trendy or not, one way or the other. He's also not an ultra-obsessive perfectionist because he COULD make the decisions fairly quickly. He knows his own mind pretty well. But he still likes stuff--not to the point of clutter or anything like that, but he's no minimalist, and it makes him feel good to have things he likes around him. At bit of a closet aesthete, I think, but not in any sort of crass way.
The character wouldn't be a reader--there are no bookcases, and the bedside table might double as a desk, but it's too full of display items for a fat stack of books. He would be intelligent but not an overt intellectual. If someone began debating Kantian ethics versus Benthanism, he'd get distinctly bored. When bored, he wouldn't make a big deal out of it but would tune out and would probably try to avoid the situation in the future, unless he really likes the people for other reasons and in other surroundings. But if it was a cause or a debate he cared about being discussed, he could be pretty passionate, though he isn't ever flamboyant nor extreme. He wouldn't be a person who hides from conflict, but he wouldn't seek it out, either.
He could be low-maintenance or not, depending upon what's in that big medicine cabinet *g*, but considering the amount of clothes and their high level of neatness, he likes to look good. I'd make the character a kind of person who likes to control his surroundings, but this would be a relatively new trend in his life (because of the newness of everything else). He's just discovered that after the decorating spree, and he likes the feeling.
I would make him feel a bit disjointed from his past and/or his family. He doesn't have anything that's ugly but sentimental nor anything from his childhood or his family, not even a single photo of everyone on their last vacation. A new-made man. A man without a past. It'd be fun to milk a little hidden melodrama out of that. ;-)
This is, of course, entirely fictionalized! I'm not trying to analyze your character or anything--that's just who I'd put in the apartment in a book. *g*
(As for what my house looks like right now, "a complete disaster" would be a very good description, as I'm doing a whole-house remodel in preparation for moving 2,000 miles across the country and into a 1950s European-designed modern house in the DC area--with 90% of the original features--which is requiring me to do a 180 in decorating style. I have inherited many, many items from my grandparents and great-grandparents--and even a few things from as early as the 1830s and before--so I'm going semi-conservative midcentury style so that I can merge everything tastefully. I don't think it'll win any "cool/small" awards at any point--it's got 2,600 sqft above grade now, 700 below, and we're adding 270 sqft more as soon as we move in and are planning another addition in the future.)
Because LOOKING nurturing, smart, and passionate is way more important than BEING nurturing, smart, and passionate.
Please tell me that's not Russell Crowe as your poster child for passion...
My place raises disturbing questions, like "why does this chap have so many pictures of Macaulay Culkin on his wall?" and "does any one person REALLY need that much vaseline?"
Patrick, where is your zebra chair from? I love it.
These apartment "types" are stupid -- they are barely sensible in the abstract and, with regard to a particular person, they are useless. If you like a person, would you change your mind due to sofa style?
"What does your apartment say?"
"It says that it is not interested in your bullshit."
I agree with Wende - Allison's Design to the Max is dead sexy baby!
neat and clean houses says something.
stylish and neat and clean says something else
disheveled and messy says something.
what does a college room say ? what does a house say - it reflects a certain point in our lives. lives change.
But we need not be obsessed about "interior design" when we find new objects. I heard a friend's wife who remarked ." I like this piece. I am going to buy and "fit" them somewhere in my house. - what does that mean"
Easy solution to all of this. Don't drag anyone home unless they're stone cold unconscious & won't remember a thing the next day:)
good one, Duncan. embarrassed about that Carmen Electra poster? date rape is always an option.
I was just thinking about this since my apartment is a bit of a mess and sooooo far out in Brooklyn it's downright unromantic to get to--who feels like smooching after a forty minute subway ride? But, I was recently in someone else's apartmennt that's not exactly below 14th Street. The distance didn't bother me, but it was so well-decorated and tidy, I found it intimidating. Compare and despair.
Jonathan, that's hysterical!
re. Carmen Electra poster.....I have no idea who that is actually. Probably a tv personality maybe? I don't watch tv fwiw. Doubt I'm missing anything:)
Oh, I love Alison's place and, of course, Patrick's place, and I think what Lydia has to say is really interesting and right-on.
I have two brief stories to tell. My college and post-college space was kind of baroque, with lots and lots of stuff on the walls. (Not just posters, though there were some fairly unique ones, mostly art, nothing dorm-typical. There were also small painted/carved display shelves, candlesticks, figurines, things hanging from pins on the wall which do not normally hang on the wall, a lot of books, and almost no matching furniture.) I was always embarrassed to show this to people, even when it was clean (it was so mismatched!), but friends loved it - they consistently described it as "cozy."
A few years on, and the same area became really cluttered and messy... too much stuff, constantly trying to get ready for moves that weren't happening, etc. I thought it was kind of mortifying, but I wasn't worried about how it would appeal to dates, because I wasn't dating, partly because of the moving plans. The guy who came in to give an estimate for the moving company saw all my crap sitting around and developed this instant, gigantic crush on me. Based partly on all the junk that was sitting around, I was told. Sometimes your mess says something about your personality and interests aside from "slob." (Mine apparently said that I like to read, write, and make stuff.)
Now the only thing I have up is a giant Japanese print on the wall over my bed, but I'm still sorting through and getting rid of things from my "old life". Nowadays all my place says is "needs more storage space."
Not sure if this is entirely along the same vein but I find it interesting that a couple who were firmly in the antiquey olde worlde camp when it came to their home did a 180 and embraced modern (albeit warm - but I bet not as warm as some ppl here may think) so thoroughly. Even to the extent of buying a victorian house, demolishing it and building a modern home in its stead.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/27/garden/27ronan.html?_r=1&ref=garden&oref=slogin
So what does that say about them except that ppl change?
Lydia--
That was some write-up... THANK YOU for taking on the challenge... (and for not saying anything unkind!!)
You were actually (I think) pretty dead-on.. except my stuff is actually more "collected over time" than it apparently appears. I like so many styles of stuff, and this is such a small space, I did put pretty severe "similarity filters" onto things, to keep it coherent, and keep me more focused.
That said, I'm working on two projects right now where I am working harder for a collected look, one traditional, one not so much, so I look forward to your assessment of those "characters."
Better than tarot and tea leaves!
I loved Lydia's description of Chez P(too) so much that I'm debating whether to link to my Flickr photos...
Some people change; some don't. I look around and am amazed at how little my taste has changed since I first got my tiny pre-pubescent hands on the big McCall's decorating book that was new back then. I don't have the *same* stuff as I had in early adulthood, but I have stuff I fantasized about having and couldn't afford.
I immediately saw myself in the "nurturer" camp as it applies to my home. I do care about the aesthetics of my home, and I would hate to be one of those people that had a decrepit ugly old La-Z-Boy "because it's comfortable."
However, when I think about it, I like to have a home that's pleasurable to the senses, but in a soothing way, not necessarily a seductive way. The countertops and floors are clean, the air smells nice, the beds look fresh and inviting to sleep in. There's a stack of fluffy towels in the bathroom. It looks like a nice place to visit and live in.
It doesn't surprise me in the slightest that this look telegraphs "I'd make a good partner and mom." I've always known that that was much more my angle than vixenish seductress.
Whew! I was afraid after I'd written that that I was being offensive or a bore. ;-)
Unlike most people, I don't have *A* style. There are certain things I won't ever like (full-blown Victorian, minimalist, Kountry Kitsch, etc.), but there are a great many things I DO like. I have no problems picking a style that suits my surroundings and sticking with that one thing, though! (What does that say about me? That I have MPD? My agent already wonders... *g*)
When we went house hunting, EVERYTHING in the area that we were looking was either faux colonial or cheaply constructed McMansions. It got to the point where I felt like I'd scream if I saw another colonial. Then we found the house we decided upon. It was DIFFERENT. I loved it. *g*
Not only that, but it's less than two miles from DH's work (so that means we'll probably go down to one car!), and it's on two acres because it backs up to a wildlife refuge and the lot couldn't be subdivided.
It's very, VERY different from my current house, which means that I'm changing my decorating for it from traditional to modern-with-midcentury-and-traditional-echoes. *g* It'll be fun! I like change. It's also SO much easier to find small-scale pieces that are modern than that are traditional, and we're not big people, so we prefer them.
Though currently my style is more "full-grain leather sofa, chair, and ottoman for less than $2000! Surely everyone will be house trained before they destroy that!" than it is anything else. ;-) (Going-out-of-business sale...regular price was $6000.)