Ask the painting contractor chickie.

Oh no! All faux!

Let's take a walk through a faux McMansion.
Have you ever noticed that so many suburban subdivisions are named after what was bulldozed to lay the concrete driveways, manicured lawns and obscenely large houses? (They are never actually called houses, but homes. Houses are so....common. Homes are special. They are yours. Having a Home suggests you are rich and sophisticated.) Hidden Ponds. Oak Meadows. Wildewood Hollows. (Putting an "e" on the end of words makes it look properly British, therefore classy.) Deer Creek Estates. (Don't you like the classy "Estates" moniker?)

Pull into the driveway. Big bland house, the large front porch sporting wrought iron benches that nobody ever uses - most people in such homes always go in and out of house through the garage, from their cars. Plastic birds and a faux-stone bunny in the beautifully manicured landscaping. Decorative corn stalks placed artfully by the front door, and some carefully rusted gardening tools in an old wheelbarrow. Mond you, the nearest farm is miles away and a landscaping company takes care of the garden and lawn. Big brass door knocker on the front door, which nobody ever uses either. But it looks mansion-y, I suppose.

Inside, the place is redolent with scented candles from Bed Bath & Beyond. Warm Vanilla Cookie. Cinammon Apple Spice. Grandmas Sugar Cookie. Roasted Hazelnut. Faux-homey smells you can buy at the store, because this kitchen looks like it has never been cooked in. There are impressive-looking copper pots and pans hanging on display, a stainless steel gas stove and about an acre of granite countertop. However, the pantry and fridge contain no flour, spices, baking soda or anything else one would make Warm Vanilla Cookies with.

Look! Lots of faux food. Minute rice, "Tastes Just Like Butter" spread, low fat strawberry cream cheese, South Beach Diet granola and breakfast bars. Jars of minced garlic, a plastic lemon willed with juice. Maple "flavored" syrup. Land o' Lakes fat-free half and half. There cannot be such a thing - half and half is half cream, half milk; it's not supposed to be fat free!
Fat free, lite and diet foods make people fat, by the way. Only fat people buy these products. Ever noticed?
Lots of soda pop, bottled water, lite Cool Whip, Eggbeater low-cholesterol egg product, low fat individually wrapped "cheese" slices, lots of canned soup.

The main floor of the house is overdecorated to the hilt. Designer faux-antique chairs (surely not designed to be sat in) with artfully tossed throws and fake antique dolls. Fake oil-paintings in gilt frames, the mass produced sort with the brushstrokes imprinted on them so they look real. "Silk" (I think they're nylon or something) flowers and plants throughout the house, no real ones. Real ones are messy. And books! Books everywhere, classics, encyclopedias, vintage history books. Books in French, even. Some of these are real, though I doubt they are ever read. Others are those fake plaster books in little stacks, under the pots of fake flowers.
The only reading material are golfing and decorating magazines, precisely fanned out on the coffee table. Not another shred of printed matter in the whole house, although there are seven TVs.
I read in a decorating magazine once that going to used bookstores, one can buy old books in all colors. It is better to choose colors that complement the decor.
Big gas log fireplace, controlled with a remote.

In every bedroom, the paint colors have been carefully matched to the bedspreads. For some reason, everyone matches the paint color to bedspreads. I do not know why this is.

Lots of fake plaster, marble and wrought iron gew-gaws. Virtually every single decorator item is Made In China and bought at T.J. Maxx. I'm pretty sure these folks can afford real art and gew-gaws, but why spend money buying things from local artisans (although the local economy could really use the support) when you can do it all in one or two swoops at T.J. Maxx? Mind you, doG forbid anyone should own anything but a GM vehicle That would be unpatriotic.

The basement has Redwings hockey memorabilia everywhere, a pool table and giant-screen TV with elaborate and impressive acoustics. Basements are the Husband's domain, usually - places relatively free of frills and decorator accents. The fake prints down here are of dead pheasants, ships and antique cars. Lots of family prints; chunky midwesterners holding dead fish, golf clubs or well fed babies. Grinning men standing next to shiny Cadillac Escalades and manly Chevy Avalanche 4x4 pickup trucks. Although I doubt anyone actually does real off road driving in these.
There is a large treadmill for fake walking and a rowing machine for fake rowing. Facing the TV so one can watch fake lives while getting toned.

This was a real house, and I was so struck by the total faux-ness of it I actually took notes. Elements of this house are common to most McMansions, although I've been in several that are nicely lived in and decorated with some Real Things.

posted by Carina @ 2:27 AM