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Welcome to Mod House Media Watch
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Modern houses and residential interiors often appear in the popular media as a prop to sell other products. Consumer products are often shown in the context of a cool modern house or a hip modern interior to cast them in a desirable light. This represents a great disconnect in our culture. The marketers clearly understand that the Modern House carries positive capital in the pitch of their product. But the housing industry lags way behind, conservative, the last to follow a trend, the first to ignore one. But it is useful to realize that the Modern House has cultural value, that it represents desirability, mainly through its exclusivity, an exclusivity that is primarily derived from its unavailability. Because it is unavailable the Modern House more often than not emerges through a singular custom commission, an expensive endeavor which brings us full circle to its exclusivity and desirability. Astute observers will realize that this represents a window of opportunity. Developers and Builders willing to offer the Modern House will enjoy a virtually untapped market. This Mod House Media Watch is intended as a wake-up call, a place to collect media placements of the Modern House in order to evidence the cultural value of the Modern House to would be Developers and Builders. This is a tool for those trying to move the market, one more piece of evidence to put before those you are trying to sway.
We are primarily interested in tracking advertising, however placements of the Modern House in film, tv programing, and other entertainment media is still of great interest, particularly when the placement is meant to influence the context of the program, ie using the Modern House to inject cool factor into a scene or build the aura of a character. We can include programs on home improvement as well when they have a modern focus. Advertising for modern furniture, high end modern kitchens, and other products already inclusive of the Modern House will not have the same significance and we likely will not include them. You can help. If you see a placement post a message to the ModHouseMediaWatch discussion topic, and see if you can track down or capture an image. We will enter it into the blog. Hopefully we can track down the back story about some of the houses in these placements. Who was the designer, where is the house, how did the placement in the ad come about.
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great placements
Jennifer - these are all great. I'd love to enter these into the blog but I will need an image of some sort. I am trying to make a nice visual with these entries. Don't kill yourself, but if you can track down a source for images I'll put together an entry.
And keep your eyes peeled for commercials. I think they speak to the salesman side of developer/builders.
The Glass House
Greg,
I was only able to find one image: http://www.themoviechicks.com/sep2001/mcrglasshouse.html
- But I did discover some background information about the architects involved (Hagy Belzberg and George Daniel Wittman)
- which was interesting: http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2001/09/24/focus3.html
You really get the best visuals from the movie trailer.
I'll research other movies and commericals tonight.
Jennifer
got it
I've got the Glass House trailer now - thanks! See what you can find on the others. I've looked for the incredibles before and could not find anything - they are holding their images tight.
Propaganda Republic seeking Movie Propaganda
FROM: www.PropagandaRepublic.com
Hello, this subject is extremely interesting to us as a small swedish/english design house. we have been told many times recently that to get our new chaise longue in hollywood movies is the only way to promote it...through product placement. One that you may track that i know of is the Allseating Fluid Chair, it was used in the film AI and only because the set designers saw it before it went into production. As our design is brand new, we sent out our first press release on 9th feb 05, it's unlikely that hollywood will hear of it just yet..but who knows..fingers crossed! If you like, you can read an independent review from the USA of our chaise longue here: http://purecontemporary.blogs.com/
A responsible future
Most of the comments I've seen here are about the oohing and ahhing over futuristic designs and not a realistic or responsible portrayal of the probable modern house. None of the designs or campaigns I see applauded here show solar or wind power being utilized and without them folks, there is no future.
Where I live there is an old hippie section of town just outside of downtown. Many of the turn of the century Victorians in that area have both solar panels for water and electricity plus small wind generators. As well, they participate in utilizing vacant lots and open spaces as either community gardens or community playgrounds.
The people in media should start setting positive examples of this type of living for the future and we, as hopeful participants in it, should demand it.
All that glitters isn't gold.
getting to a responsible future
I don't argue against your dream of a sustainable future, but there are big obstacles to getting there. This blog is not about celebrating the values reflected in the commercials. Its intended to point out a contradiction in the cultural bias against modern houses in the marketplace - building modern houses = bad, selling stuff with modern houses = good. If we can break through this it opens up a lot of possibilities. You might not see it but we are fighting the same fight - this blog is just aimed at chipping away at one focused area.
Getting there
Unless those ample glass walls are aligned with the winter sun and fill with foam at night the modern house is hugely wasteful. If you ask me the modern house is one that makes the most of energy and is affordable for the worlds growing population and not just a select group of people who want to express themselves in design.
show the way
Switz, I agree with you and I'd say we need a blog here at LiveModern that promotes those values - and you are just the one to write it. Step up.
As far as the CSH#22, it was designed in the 1950s in a different time. I don't think anybody here at livemodern is holding that up as an ideal for a sustainable future. None the less the house has cultural content that the advertisers are eager to leverage.
And don't be completely prejudiced against a glass house. The Dwell House 2 project is out to prove a glass house can be environmentally correct.
Down with Love; One Hour Photo; Alias
DOWN WITH LOVE (Rene Zellweger/Ewan McGregor) is a delightful movie with equally lovely set design inspired by classic romantic comedies of the 50s/60s like Pillow Talk. Check out images and explanation here: http://www.setdecorators.org/hotofftheset/down_with_love/.
Also, the young family in ONE HOUR PHOTO (Robin Williams), has an expansive minimalist modern home too.
ALIAS (ABC), the only tv series I'm into right now, also has a great modern California home. I think the set design won an Emmy.
Will keep my eyes peeled. Thanks!
Down with Love
You know, I watched Down With Love recently and although I don't think it fits the mission here exactly, the set work on this movie was so great I'd like to include it anyway. I had not been able to find images until now - thank you!
Movies and MoCo
Greg,
What a great idea! Most of the movies I've listed only have short shots of the houses/apartments and may not be included in the trailers: http://www.imdb.com/
Glass House (Please take a look at this one!) The Incredibles (family home) Mission Impossible II (the evil lair) Bourne Supremacy (another bad guy's pad - very nice apartement) Thirteenth Floor (house at the end) Sleeping with the Enemy (The dark characters seem to have really good taste!) Ferris Buller's Day Off (Cameron's house) Matchstick Men (This house actually belongs to some regular folks -- the movie crew moved in for a few weeks to film there.)
Jennifer