Want It Wednesday: Maison Martin Margiela Tchotchkes

Jul 20, 2011

Of all the words that could potentially be used to describe the enormously innovative work done over the past few decades by Maison Martin Margiela, I think that “clever” is the most apt. Margiela’s best work always makes me smile, even when the themes are dark, because the man (and the company, which he may or may not have left, depending on who you believe) always comes up with a way to take the basic thing that we all know and twist our expectations into something that makes a huge (if sometimes subtle) visual statement.

With that in mind, it only makes sense that the Maison Martin Margiela by L’Atelier d’Exercices collaboration, the subject of this week’s Want It Wednesday, has yielded such an interesting crop of decor objects. From relatively mundane items like an ostrich feather pen ($60) to the downright bizarre faux door decal ($460), I’d love to have a few of these things around the house.

If you’ve ever seen pictures of clean, minimal, ultramodern homes in design magazines and wondered where exactly the people who own them get the perfectly crafted objects are the home’s only non-furniture decor, this is it. Mystery solved! And now if I only had the sort of house that would make a fitting backdrop to these art pieces. My favorite, of course, is the magnifying glass that looks like half of a pair of broken glasses. The fact that it bears more than a passing resemblance to my actual glasses only makes it better.