I guess I'd go for the steal in my art studio- I don't want to worry about trashing the real deal- although I'd be more likely to pick something that just flat out wasn't trying to be something else (vintage but cheap!). I would probably pick something non-iconic rather than knock off iconic. Either way, I wouldn't put the real deal (if valuable) in an art studio or playroom... too much stress! I want my home to be beautiful AND livable!

That being said, if you wait long enough, you can get the real deal for a steal!

http://cozylittlecave.blogspot.com

I don't think there's anything wrong with a lower price point piece that's SIMILAR to a high-end design...but a complete copy-cat knock off? that's artistic theft....a big no-no

I cannot afford design furniture. I will probably never be able to do so. I can afford target furniture. If I find something there I like, I do not care if it is a knockoff. I buy things I see that I love and will fit in my home. Like their knock-off emeco navy chairs (which I actually scored 4 for $100 on craigslist)

I understand why knockoffs are bad and they hurt the designer. But I could/would NEVER buy the original. They aren't losing a dime off me.

Do what is right for you. In your home. I am sick of seeing people on these comment boards getting so worked up.

There will always be knock-offs of great design, art, etc. Sometimes, one can reinforce the other. While I think it's ideal to support the original designer/artist, there are practical considerations. Should I live without pets? By that measure, I couldn't have my own father in my home for dinner b/c he can be a little clumsy. I think there's enough pressure for people with means to buy authentic items (and I define "means" as someone who can have these pieces in their home and not feel like they and everyone who enters has to treat the place with museum care). However, do I think someone who works well over 40 hours a week and still barely makes ends meet should feel guilty about buying a reproduction so they can have a space that matches their design aesthetic and aspirations? Absolutely not.

There was a really interesting article on why knockoffs are good for designers a while back. I think it was in the NYTimes. It was in relation to fashion rather than decor, but I bet the principle holds. The author basically said that the desire to have something different is what drives early adopters and once that something is no longer different (ie, has been knocked off so that normal people can afford it) they go out and buy the next big thing. It's certainly a slower cycle with furniture, but it's probably very similar.

I never had any problems with knockoffs before I read the article, my budget comes first and for the most part I wouldn't know designer furniture if it bit me, but the article amused me.

I agree with CozyLittleCave. I'd never go for the real deal unless it was a steal, and I'd also never buy a knockoff, mostly because the mass-produced, low-quality nature usually makes it a waste of money for something that's not unique. I can't afford design furniture either, but thanks to craigslist and patience, I've never spent more than $200 on a piece of furniture, and I don't often hear someone look at my house and say, oh, I have that too!

I wonder if it is a famous knock-off does it still count. I scored three Burke tulip chairs for $45 and I think I got the steal of the century.

Years ago, I bought two knockoff Arne Jacobsen chairs, feeling guilty but thinking I'd never be able to afford the real thing anyway. A couple of years ago, we needed four more chairs so, on a lark, I searched eBay and actually found four real, vintage chairs for less than four knockoffs would have been! I should have held out in the first place, is the lesson I've learned. Now I'm on the hunt for two more of the real ones to replace my original knockoffs. You can see how they're slightly mismatched here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/visualingual/2437958941/in/set-72157594505190197/

The chair on the right is the knockoff. I'm so embarrassed by it now!

Not everyone is meant to own a Ferrari, wear a Rolex, carry a Prada bag, have huge breasts or have a full head of hair either -
- but we all laugh at the guy driving the 1980's Pontiac Fiero w/ the "Ferrari" bodykit, the person who bought a $25 "Faulex" on the street corner that stopped working after a week, the gal w/ the vinyl "Pravda" bag that's falling apart at the seams and a large chest that doesn't move and the guy in the toupee.

Knockoff furniture is just as tacky.

I would agree with abc123 - I think there is a major difference between "inspired by" and a direct steal. Case in point - The Ikea Poang chair is a derivative of a classic bent wood Alvar Aalto chair designed in 1939 (http://www.artek.fi/products/armchairs/33). However, it's not identical. Rather, the Poang can stand on it's own as a decent design. Compare this to souless direct copies of designer furniture (Eames chairs, Jacobsen's Swan and 7 chairs, etc).

I'm in a point in my life where I am able to buy some expensive "real deal" items. But I still mix those with cheaper things from Ikea and Craigslist that still fit the definition of "good design."

Complete knock-offs of classics that are out of copyright like the Barcelona chair don't bother me at all. Besides who would spend $6,000 for a chair when you can get an identical one for literally 10% of that?

Yesterday's post on the Eames Nelson wall hooks/hangers drew a large number of sneers at buying the real thing when the knockoff was cheaper.

While I know it's extremely difficult for me to afford a real designer piece like the Eames Lounger, I know I can afford the genuine Eames Nelson wall hooks. Can I get a knockoff much cheaper elsewhere? Sure, but if I can afford the real thing, why not take some pride in that?

And besides that, the first moment some damage happens to that 6000 dollar piece, I would say "this is why I can't have anything nice."

Bepsf has nailed it.

Knock-offs are tacky as well as immoral. If you want your home, your pride and joy, to look tacky - go for it.

Another issue is the sheer amount of MONEY these designers charge! For something that painstakingly took hours/days of hand carving/crafting/painting then sure....but machine-made/assembled? I'll wait till its on clearance, thanks ...or buy something similar from a more reasonable price point

The knockoff Prada bags, Rolex watches, etc. that you see being sold on the street are not just design theft, they are (more often than not) made in sweatshops and invariably have ties to organized crime operations, drug trafficking, human trafficking, illegal weapons trading, etc. (In fact, there is even some evidence to suggest that sales of knockoff t-shirts helped fund 9/11.)

Where does furniture fit into all of this? Well, at one time, counterfeiters stuck to making funny money. Then they moved on to fake fashion. Nowadays, the Museum of Counterfeiting in Paris shows exhibits of counterfeit electronics, food, and other everyday goods alongside the fake Vuitton bags.

Will crime bosses make the foray into knockoff home design? Once they find a way to make it profitable, probably. They will stop at nothing (case in point: the Museum estimates up to 10 percent of the world's *medication* is knocked off - if they'll make phony Prozac, why not a fake Eames chair?).

I'd rather sit on an old apple crate for 10 years than buy a fake chair if buying the fake meant giving even a cent of my money to drug dealers and pimps...and someday, buying knockoff home goods could entail doing precisely that.

(For more information on the counterfeit trade, visit www.fakesareneverinfashion.com., www.unifab.com - which operates the Museum; warning - text is all in French, or read "Deluxe" by Dana Thomas.)

@bepfs: That argument only holds if people are only buying furniture for the prestige factor, not if they like the design, don't care about impressing other people, and can't afford the original.

Stiletto,

Although the really bad knock-offs are generally sweatshop work, designers like Prada and Gucci now manufacturing their lower priced items (under $1,000 believe) in China...and many of the knock-offs are now being made in the same factories as the authentic ones...the NYT did a piece on that whole controversy a few years ago

I end up knocking off stuff all the time. Prada dress? Not on my budget-- I made a "knockoff" myself.

I feel the same way about furniture. If you can't afford what you want, make it yourself. If you can't make it yourself, find someone who can.

Good design is good design. Period.

It's always a reality check when, no matter what art you choose to enjoy, there will always be a mega snob to try to make you feel poopy about your artistic choices and likes.

That said, right on with whoever said buy what makes you happy. Life is too short and the world too crazy to judge if an Eames chair knockoff is 'tacky.' If it makes me tacky, then so be it. At least I can afford to eat AND have a lovely chair to sit in... Many of us could not even begin saving up for a 6000 dollar chair. Just because you're poor doesn't mean you can't have style. You just have to learn to ignore the snooty tooty people and learn to embrace your budgetary restraints. Makes you more creative! I've found that in interior design as well as my main job, filmmaking.

Rant over!

I have to interject a couple opinions here.

1. It's an obvious fact that money does NOT buy style. We don't get too many of THOSE kinds of homes featured on this blog but we've all seen them.

2. So many people confuse the idea of good design with whatever is expensive. I'm confused as to how a chair design that was meant to be "for the masses" is only affordable by the wealthy today, when the only reason it wasn't produced in its time was because manufacturing processes would have made it too expensive. and now the same chair retails at a base of $3000.wth?

3. As an aside, Couture is considered the pinnacle of good fashion design while astronomically expensive yet none of you are tossing off your Gap clothing to take a stand about how you only support REAL or good fashion design when most every day fashion is a paired down version of stuff on the Paris runways. Why is there this diva sense of entitlement over furniture and interior objects? Why the hypocrisy?

I'm so tired of this argument over inanimate objects when there are so many people who can't afford half the stuff on this blog.

The trends and ideas of designer furniture and decorating trickle down to Target, etc., which is great. Obviously the people paying $3000 for a designer rug know they're getting a quality product (and it should be visible), so what does it matter if someone gets a $50 rug that's inspired by the high-end but made affordable?

I don't agree with absolutely knock-offs - but isn't that illegal anyway? I know fashion designers have sued Forever 21 in the past, so I'm sure it can be done in the home design world.

If you love the look of Saarinen and Eames and can only afford Burke and Plycraft, there should be no shame in that. We'd love to have the "real deal" but the reality is most of us can't live in a museum, or might not want to if we could. The Eames intent was to make good design affordable to the masses, yet now, the pieces are out of reach for many. Buy what you love and can afford and ignore the haters whose egos are tied to what amounts to expensive pieces of wood.

Just a bit of homespun theory here:
I think it may come down to the sense of entitlement and exclusivity "I've got something that only 1 in a 10,000 people can afford".

If it's not illegal what's the problem?

Note: Statistic is a guestimate, may not be 100% accurate.

@bepfs:

The examples you gave all relate to people who are deliberately trying to pass off fakes as the real deal. If I bought a knock-off 'whatever' I would NEVER try to claim it was authentic! Did you ever see the interview with Michael Jackson where he swore up and down he hadn't had plastic surgery? Same mindset. These people earn my pity as much as my scorn.

You have to research... if you are knocking off a company that hand makes everything and treats their employees decent then I think it's wrong to buy their knock offs... but if you are buying a knock off of a company that is made in china you probably aren't buying something of cheaper quality anyway. If there is a design you really like just look up a little info about it... Buy what you like, but you can find a lot of good quality vintage designer furniture on Craigslist... we have 2 beautiful Eames chairs, one from the 70s and one from the 80s, less than half the price. We have the real deal! You just gotta be patient.

Oh and plus the joy of buying vintage is that it's already used, so you aren't as disappointed if you ding something up. It comes with a little bit of history.

I have one designer knockoff. It's a Barcelona loveseat. I needed something to seat two and didn't care for the daybed, and loved the Bauhaus Modernism of the Barcelona chair. It's a knockoff I can stand behind, because it riffs off the original. And the loveseat was like, $500 or so brand new, free shipping. I don't like to buy used upholstery, I have nightmares about bed bugs.

This is what it looks like, though this isn't the site I bought it at. Loveseat GIF

I paid like $150 a Euro-to-US converter for this
Pigeon Light,
because I thought the design was so clever it deserved to be rewarded. And so clever no one's knocked it off yet. It's an excellent bedside lamp. But it was way out of my budget & is the only light I've ever actually spent more than $10 on.

I'm a designer, I think it's important to support other designers. And I'm building a baby collection, you know. It's equally important to riff / build off of old designs. I don't know about the legal aspects of this, but I feel morally content with my design decisions. I don't know if there really is a high ground with this, in any case. I think people who buy fiberglass Eames repros are foolish because they're following a fetishization of the original whilst the actual philosophies are being ignored.

Everything else in my house, with the exception of IKEA bedslats & an IKEA closet (and some string lamps, yannoooh), is a street find, salvaged or I made it myself. My coffee table in front of the Barcelona sofa is, sad to say, a piece of masonite scrap on CMU blocks and my dining room table is acrylic scrap over found redwood frames.

I would never buy a knock off pure and simple.

There's a difference between "knock-off" and "counterfeit".

And most of us are buying "knock-offs" and don't even realize it. Who can do the research to find out if the sweater you bought at the gap isn't a knock-off of a Max Azaria??

When a design gets "filtered down" as you put it, it ceases to be what it was...

So over and above the compelling arguments of the ethics of "stealing" the work of a designer by means of knock-offs, is the issue of the resulting weakness of the design.

Most of the time, the copies are not improvements, they are just cheaper, and so cut corners. Why not try to find something well-made and well-designed in the appropriate price point?

Oh right. Because retailers (e.g. IKEA) have effectively taken the middle-option off the table.

http://www.amazon.com/Cheap-High-Cost-Discount-Culture/dp/159420215X

We've shopped ourselves into a corner, with only high-end and low-end offerings left, and nothing in between. I'm hoping that some designers and retailers will step into the breach...

I am not going to overpay simply because a company wants to coast on a past design and artificially prop up inflated prices.

Wise furniture design companies should do what Apple did with the iPhone - high ticket buy in for the early adopters, market competitive price for the broader market, then bargain prices to rope in the pokey masses. If your posh design stores did that, there wouldn't be any knock offs because there wouldn't be a market for them. They'd make bank selling great design originals to everyone.

Knock-offs are unacceptable under all circumstances....

First... it's because YOU as buyer know it is, so every time you see it you know it, UGH!

Second... quality.... 'nough said.

It's been proven countless times, on this forum and everywhere else... as designers or creative people as we are... that styles and looks can be emulated with some logic, practicality and ingenuity.

We can't afford to have (well most of us) custom design stuff. So if you can't have the Versace pillow, you can get the fabric and make your own... that works on almost all other aspects...the artwork...accesories...

Don't you feel kind of put off everytime you go somewhere and see a noguchi table and wonder if mr. noguchi actually saw this piece or was involved in it's production process or as it actually most probable is... just some mass produced thing in china..

Make sure that from time to time you can really invest on an original design piece... No matter what size or price, depending on your priorities.. Then.. when you walk into your room, you directly see it and feel good with yourself... and you'll notice it'll make all the rest around it look better.

If you cannot buy originals try to make sure that whatever else you buy to compensate is of the best materials you can get your hands on... It will not have a label but it will sure have quality and it will be noticed....

I buy what I like and what I can afford, and I don't care who the designer is. I probably have items in my house that I purchased at Target or Ikea or elsewhere that are technically knock-offs of some famous design. Well, I didn't know it when I bought it, and I won't care if I ever find out. I don't make my purchases to make a statement to the world about my fabulous taste and ability to buy expensive designs. I buy what I like. And as for durability, I've had most of my stuff for many years. You can usually tell whether something is flimsy or not before you buy it.

Also, I think it's a ridiculous argument that people need to research every single purchase they make, to ensure that it's sweatshop-free/an original design (or acceptable sub)/carbon-neutral/organic/etc. Yes, in an ideal world, that's what we'd all do and rainbows and puppies and peace and love. But most of us have to work and, you know, live our lives.

If you want to invest the time and energy in order to be the most responsible consumer you can be, then awesome, more power to you. But don't look down your nose at the rest of us with our knock-off Eames chairs and IKEA bookcases and H&M clothes and non-free-range chicken dinners. It's not as though we're all willfully and happily enjoying propagating extant consumer culture. Blanket moralizing about purchasing decisions doesn't help your cause and only alienates potential allies.

If a knock-off is "tacky", then isn't the real deal "tacky" also? Who in the world will know you bought a fake if you don't tell them? (stop being friends with furniture designers if they can!) This is aesthetics we're talking about, not principles. If buying what is pleasing to your eye and is pleasing to your checkbook is tacky, then majority rules on takcy. Is this discussion elitist much or what? I thought this was apartmenttherapy.com, not luxurypenthousetherapy.com. Besides, I've had the pleasure of coming into contact with people who make many tens of times more money than I do and I've learned with great happiness that being able to afford more expensive things does not equate good taste. I aslo know many people who could only afford the fakes, but have a very high level of taste in making an interesting and beautiful setting. My background is in fashion by the way, not interiors. (You better believe my eye can spot a knock-off Dior a mile away! However, I'm more interested in discussing art or politics than how much they spent on thier PVC Samuri bag.)

I don't believe in ripping off someone else's artistry though we're certainly seeing it happen at low end retailers constantly. I think most of the buying public isn't highly educated on source design so hasn't a clue. My own home is a mixture of high end/low end, I usually don't pay attention to labels (let me just throw a tarp over that designer dining table I bought for a steal), I buy what I like. On occasion though, when I've sourced an original piece, I've found that a knock-off was re-sized to be just more COMFORTABLE. Anyone else find that?

slowdown: what a tirade, you might take the advice of your own moniker, slow down a bit! It's all about personal choice and, yes, I invest the time but then I share the information with others who want to know because I know not everyone makes the time commitment I make (but many still want to know the results of the research).

I would bet cold hard cash people here who say they'd never buy a knock-off have and probably don't know it. If you've shopped at Ikea, West Elm, CB2, Target, or pretty much any shop other than the original designer's studio, you've bought a damn knock off so stop acting so elitest. I'm laffing myself crazy over this because the same people need to only look down at their clothes, shoes, or even their general lifestyle to see that THEY are knockoffs. this is all getting funnier by the minute. Maybe someone should do a better job about defining the term knock-off. Is it derivative trickle down design? Or blatant rip-off just made with cheaper materials? What is it?

Most of the time, the steal. Things get ruined - discussion ended.

The only thing I want to add to this is that price DOES NOT equal quality. I've bought expensive pieces of *$%@ and some inexpensive things that have surprised me in their craftsmanship.

When you buy a $300 chair vs the $3000 original, it's not like the original was made with thousands of dollars worth or some rare materials, most of the time the were made with the same stuff and for relatively the same price point. It's usually a case of the original becoming Iconic which now makes it only WITHIN REACH of the design elite and not it's original demographic 50 years ago.

It's hard to tell someone that if the see something they like and can afford that the need to go home and research it to find out if it's inspired by and original and then save up for it until they can buy it, even if that's 5/10 years from now. That may work for something like a house or even a nice car but for a lamp...really?

I would be interested to hear what some of these original designers say about the subject and if they are not ok with it, why they haven't they put a stop to it via copyright laws, etc.

deal: Eames. you CAN find deals. I just picked up a repaired plywood Eames chair (low) for 60. nothing will make you happier.
steal: Noguchi-like lamps. Little Tokyo: go snoop in the older gift shops. Ikea used to make one. Sigh.

worst is half way: CB2

I bought my best friend and her husband a Louis Ghost chair for their wedding earlier this month. It is so gorgeous, I totally want one for myself. However, there's no way I can justify spending $700 (Canadian, including shipping...) on a chair for me. I'm considering getting myself a knock-off for my art studio...still a little expensive, but do-able.

@Rucy: Arguing with some conviction is hardly engaging in a "tirade".

I'm just frustrated by the simple-minded way some people sneer at those who buy knock-offs as "tacky" or even "immoral", then preen themselves as being too good or smart or tasteful to ever do the same (which I doubt; I agree with deedee914 that most people probably own knock-offs and are unaware of it).

This topic comes up on this blog fairly regularly and yet people still engage in this kind of narrow-minded, judgmental snobbery. It's unbelievable.

Why do people keep bringing this up on this site. Some of you, like bepsf and Rucy almost need medication to calm yourselves down. It is so judgmental and narrow minded. I think some of you are fortunate enough to apparently have perfect, worry-free lives where THIS is a big deal to you. Move on. seriously.

1. 90% of people can't afford the 'real deal' unless it's 2nd, 3rd, or 4th hand. But everyone can afford to have an imagination.

2. What are we considering a 'knock-off'? Any design inspired by an original or just cheap copy-cat stuff?

3. Furnishing your home should be about making you comfortable not about pampering a designer's ego.

4. Sometimes I like the 2nd and 3rd generations of an idea better.

5. Knock-off isn't synonymous with 'crappy quality'.

6. If only I had the time to give this some serious thought... but silly me, I'm too busy working, hanging out with friends, finishing a ceramics degree, worrying about grad school, thrifting, and playing house in my first apartment with my sweetheart.

7. And actually, I buy or make whatever I think is neat looking. I don't much care for a designer label unless I absolutely love the original design.

8. What do you consider reproductions?

alouishus I'm worshipping you over here.

This is where Apartment Therapy tends to split on everything. The designers and architects who do this for a living and are horrified that their life's work can be/is being "knocked off" or made available to the masses instead of the moneyed elite. Versus the DIYers who don't do anything of the kind. When I started out reading this site, it was pretty darn clearly for the DIYers and a few professionals who were up for fun and off the wall. (Prize for Small Cool was gift cert for a moving company). Now it swings back and forth and in my opinion, gets inappropriately irate and shrill.

I sort of get it for the profs, because it's the same in any industry. I would hate to go on boards "about" my industry and find people doing their own (to my prof eye) unskilled hacks. But I do think there must be more professional design oriented sites out there no?

Anyway, someone commented when we did Small Cool that "no homeowner who would own an Eames rocker would have cluttered Ikea shelves for toys" or something about that ridiculous. Apparently it's surprising to design profs, but this is how most middle class families live. I've been in 50 family apartments in NY in the last 2-3 years, and you know, 40 or 45 of them look unique yet have the same sort of mix of designed and mass pieces.

The answer to the question "Can a knock off ever be okay?" is "Yes, for some regular-life people some of the time. But also No, not for some or many people who decorate/design/create spaces for a living." Whether you snicker or not, the knock offs sell because people buy them and like them.

Basically if you want the design you want the real deal. Otherwise you're just after 'the look'. And if looks were all that mattered knock-offs wouldnt be a problem.

But quality and longevity matter - and knock-offs are never as well made as the real thing (why do you think they cost 90% less?).

I was at a party once and this girl had a (fake) barcelona chair. Another, somewhat heavier girl, sat on it. Or rather, sat through it. 3 straps broke and the fat girl ended up with sangria all over her. Meanwhile I've seen Eames chairs that have lived for 50 years, through kids and pets.

If you really want it you need to keep your eyes open because the deals are out there. I scoured Craigslist for 3 years and finally found an Eames Lounge for $500 (needed some simple restoration). I sit in it every day, and my fat friends sit in it too.

And if you want the design, nothing will make you happier than the day you get (whether you save, scrounge or trade) for the real thing.

Also - for every rock-star design out there, there are other great, legitimate alternatives.

If you really want a Nelson bench, look at Paul McCobb or Lane Tables.

If you want Eames plywood dining chairs look at Thonet from the 60s.

If you want Emeco chairs look for Goodform or Allsteel.

If you want an Egg chair look at Overman.

LOL... whenever the I (rarely)/ the cats (constantly) /my fiance (frequently) break/mess up something in our home, I have a little voice in my head that whines "This is why we can't have nice things!!!!"

We actually do have nice things, and they do get messed up, and it sucks but you just have to live with it. I second buying vintage, it lessens the pain of chips and dings... I have a rule actually, that if I can buy something vintage or hand made I'm not allowed to buy it from a big box store, etc., (unless I'm seriously going to have DREAMS about it). I break my rule a lot but it helps! Anyway I think this is the middle ground between design originals and "knock offs" which to me means cheaply made mass-produced imitations (if you widen it to "products inspired by" it gets ridiculous, I can't believe people actually get worked up over that). We're slowly accumulating a nice collection of furniture (SLOWLY) and have yet to hit up either a DWR or an Ikea.

Anyway, I was raised to faintly feel like displaying any obvious brand-- even a good one-- is a little trashy, because true class/money means you have bespoke everything. Real class would be the beautiful leather bag that you had made for you in a tiny no-name shop in Milan (not the Birkin bag), the furniture you had made for you in Bali, etc., etc. Oddly enough that is becoming *more* accessible through Etsy, etc., just as luxury brands get higher out of reach and the mass market heads downward. Honestly I feel like it's ridulous to be so snobby based on a person's stuff, but if I *were* going to be judgy that's how I would do it, so all the design snobs wouldn't make the cut!

That said I really want some Baughman chrome Chippendale chairs for our dining room and a white Bertoia chair for the living room, but real/vintage ones are out of reach for now. Anyone want to make them for me...? ;)

Forgive me for saying, but sometimes the design world can be a little high and mighty. Most of us can only afford the knock off's. I live in Miami and even the second hand stores sell for exhorbitant prices. More and more people are moving away from spending big bucks on furniture when there are jobs being lost out there.... I do agree that it should not be an exact replica. I wouldn't want a fake Eames or Knoll for instance, but there are some finds that have an Eames or Knoll "feeling" that would do for me. When you do it yourself, you are not really in it for the whole "made up" look of things. You are in it for the ecclectism of it all.

Modfan -- The biggest reason knock-offs cost less isn't the materials. It's just that by then they've found an easier way to make the item and some designer isn't screaming that they must get rich off this one piece.

This also brings to mind the time that I got to see Andy Goldworthy speak on campus - I was very surprised at how vitriolic and petty he got when talking about his work. At one point, he put up a slide of one of his stacked-rock eggs (very beautifully done), and then showed a slide of a trailer home that had a stacked pile of rocks next to it. He then went on to disparage the inhabitants of the trailer and sneer at their attempt to have something beautiful on their land.

I think that the ridiculous thing about it was that it's hard to imagine that he has the corner on the market of anything involving stacking rocks in a pile. If they'd affixed a placard to the site describing it as a Goldsworthy piece, then he'd have a point. But is he going to go after every kid who piles rocks up on a beach?

fisheggs, that's greed pure and simple. Not pride or love of the art, just greed.

We are going for knocking off furniture for our bathroom vanity due to poor customer service from the company we have made purchases from in the past. In our world we only knock off furniture for our own home to make things with our own hands & plus you get so much more finish options.
Since we are so ticked off with this euro company we are going to offer our Solidworks drawings for all the world to see & have a try at making their own spin off on a Happy D vanity at a fraction of the cost. The only tough item on this furniture knock off is to find a local furniture maker that is good a creating curved ply drawer front...
I would love to see Duravit try & sue us- maybe then they would be wasting the same amount of time we spent dealing with crappy customer service...