Article: Brizo FLW Bath Collection

[DavidC]

Brizo® Brand Continues an Iconic Vision with the New Frank Lloyd Wright® Bath Collection


FLW Bath Collection Virtual Showroom


David

[SDR]

Impressive design and presentation !

S

[DavidC]

Frank Lloyd Wright Bath Collection by Brizo - (1:39)

Virtual Unveiling of the Frank Lloyd Wright Bath Collection by Brizo - (31:39)

His Vision Continued. - (4:30)


David

[Roderick Grant]

I'm unimpressed. This looks like a fad that, 10 years down the line, interior decorators will denigrate the way they scoff at Golden Harvest and Avocado refrigerators of the 60s.

[DRN]

The faucets are attractive as objects, some more than others, but I don’t see them as necessarily Wrightian. Why bring him into it?

The advertising presentation is laughable. Staging the faucets as abstracted buildings in mock contoured site models does what? A faucet should be designed to compliment a design, not dominate it, or be it. Fixtures with clean lines and simple forms are good, but drama is unnecessary.

The Usonian Automatic “virtual showroom” misses some marks too: Robie sconces low in a bath room? Ceiling blocks misaligned with window wall blocks?

Curmudgeonly yours,
DRN

[SDR]

Undeniably. And the corner of the glazed-block wall is wrong, too. Now I notice a bit of rubble-stone in the corner, and not the Wrightian kind, either.

What is that thing supporting the shower head ? One interesting note is the piece of farm machinery or equipment on the (flooded ?) floor, receiving the shower water. Didn't Wright employ something similar as part of a fountain, perhaps at Taliesin West ?

I do like the colors and the camera movement. Virtually all such plumbing hardware has become a matter of (unnecessarily expensive) fashion, as variable and arbitrary as anything on the runway.

Can anyone doubt what Mr Wright's reaction would be, to these latter-day abuses of his name ? Or would he applaud the effort to keep that name alive, with the licensing proceeds funding the necessary, endless and ongoing work . . .

S

[DRN]

Licensing fees are good, but the products need to be based on Wright’s designs, or at the very least, his principles. I don’t see these as doing that.

The shower pool doesn’t know if it is a shower or a fountain...is one supposed to stand in the little hole in the center? Wright’s fountain had 3 holes....

[SDR]

Quite odd, surely. Guess I'm a sucker for so-called production values---the craft of visual presentation, divorced from content.

"Interpretation" of an artist's work necessarily implies that the object contrived is not in fact the faithful copying of the original. We honor faithful copying in all forms of mechanical and/or crafted reproduction, whether it be in the medium of print, of film, of music: clear, sharp, "transparent" recreation of the original content. Why do we sneer at "copying" when it comes to the reuse of an artist's work---surely the only honest honoring of that work ?

We've mentioned the travesty that is a Leopold Stokowski "transcription" of a Bach organ work. If only they were really transcriptions, not bombastic and hysterical rearrangements for full orchestra ! When is it all right to crib from the greats while claiming that the work is somehow still theirs ? How about never . . .!

S

[Roderick Grant]

Bach In Drag is more popular (on radio, at least) than the magnificent original.

My favorite bathroom appliance is Kohler's Darth Vader Black Toilet that was on display in the traveling Usonian Automatic years ago.

There can be sensitive reinterpretations of great art. For instance, Vincent Van Gogh's version of Hiroshige's "Evening Squall on Great Bridge in Atake" is a Western take on one of the greatest works of the greatest Japanese artist, but in no way is an insult to the master.

[SDR]

Surely I don't propose a rule so broad as to admit of no exception. In Van Gogh's case he wasn't making something that could be mistaken for the Japanese original. Some of my furniture designs are noticeably Wrightian---but I wouldn't dream of using the man's name in promoting it.

S

[DavidC]

frank lloyd wright bath collection launch - (1:39)


David

[BBuck]

May God help us all. What am I missing here?
I actually kinda like the forms, but the marketing is just horrid. I'm so glad I'm no longer in the ad biz.

My 4 cents.

I miss you all.

BBuck

[SDR]

Heh-heh. Returning to the video, I find that I left it half-way through on the last watching. Hmm . . .

We miss you too, Bill. Come back, little Sheba !

S

[DavidC]

Mike Miller of Brizo® Joins Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation's Board of Trustees


David