| Edification value |  |
|---|---|
| Entertainment value |  |
| Should you go? | |
| Time spent | 19 minutes |
| Best thing I saw or learned | The front doors of the school of interior design are massive, wooden, sliding. When the revolution comes, the building will ensure that interior designers hold out a little longer than say doggie daycare purveyors or third-generation coffee roasters. |
If you wake up one day and want to be an interior designer, there are worse places you could learn your new trade than the New York School of Interior Design. Occupying a midtown building that runs through the entire block, the school has a gallery that’s open to the public.
Unless you’re in the trade, or on a self-imposed mission to go to every museum in the city, I’m not sure really why you’d want to go to an interior design museum. I didn’t find much terribly edifying here.
The current show is of student work that somehow redefines “traditional” — which in this world means English Country or French Provencal style. Several classes held competitions sponsored by Brizo, Ethan Allen, Hinkley Lighting, Mottahedeh, and Sunbrella, to produce designs that solve a brief using the manufacturers’ products well or creatively. A concept familiar to anyone who’s watched Top Chef or Project Runway, without getting to see the drama, or Padma Lakshmi.
The exhibition gives a sense of the kinds of challenges student interior designers face, and there were one or two cool things. And of course the exhibit itself was beautifully designed. But overall it was too crass and commercial for my tastes, and if this exhibit typifies what they show, I’d say anyone not in the immediate orbit of the school or the field should skip it.
For Reference:
| Address | 170 E 70th Street, Manhattan |
|---|---|
| Website | nysid.edu |
| Cost | Free |