The Beauty in Imperfection

We live in an era obsessed with the artisan. The white block has been well and truly bumped by the artisan sourdough. The instant coffee with the single origin. The department store furniture has been replaced by the treasured relic or the coveted antique and the mass has been replaced with the micro everything.

We rip up our monotone carpet and frantically polish the boards beneath to bring back the old timber. We talk about exposed beams and saving those original tessellated tiles. We don’t want perfect. We want character. We want the irregular, offbeat version, and it’s all the more desirable for its flaws. We shy away from perfect, and when we do come across it, we subconsciously look for the flaw.

We want products with stories, with a sense of history and character. We want textures and surfaces that bring light and movement, and are suggestive of a life lived not a perfect polish. Think dusty paint shades and rubbed back timber. Aged copper and crinkled book pages that suggest a favourite novel or a treasured story. It isn’t that we just accept imperfection. The imperfection is the point.