It was high school gym class, and a classmate, looking to validate his negative assessment of my mode of dress with our gym teacher who stood nearby, pointed out to him how absurd I looked with my T-shirt tucked into my gym shorts. The teacher, rather than side with my classmate, defended me, saying that I looked neat and that my classmate might want to see me as an example of someone to emulate, not deride. It was a small triumph.

Growing up, I was tidy and neat, always preferring the well-kept, the organized, pristine, the newly made. Over time, I have grown to appreciate old world charm and antiques, even if they are less than “perfect.” I have come to know many artists, who typically prefer the unmeasured, unmanicured, unkempt – flaws that in some way give things character.
My exploration of this alternate universe reached its pinnacle when I was introduced to the decorative world of Rachel Ashwell by a friend. I was impressed with the ambiance of the store and wrote Off-White By Design. I began to investigate Rachel’s world of Shabby Chic as well as French country decor. I even had employees from the Ashwell team come to my home and make a proposal for a badly needed redecoration of my apartment.

However, I never went through with their plan. Their solution seemed quite pricey and honestly, the old neat and tidy man came out – I found many of the articles just too rough, poorly made, and overpriced. I guess one could say that I ultimately just found the look too shabby, or at least did not want to pay good money for that which I did not find particularly chic.

Recently, I found myself in the very same home of the friend who introduced me to Rachel Ashwell. I was helping sift and sort through her possessions in her residence in Staten Island, which had been flooded in Hurricane Sandy. The entire experience has been unpleasant. While in her living room, I was stunned when I came across a badly damaged, water-soaked copy of the classic Shabby Chic by Rachel Ashwell. There it sat on the water logged carpet, the ultimate in irony – the modern day bible for the celebration of all things shabby, sitting amidst rubble soaked in seawater with traces of sewage.

In the showrooms of SoHo and the homes of the well-healed, the deliberate selection and placement of the aged and worn may in fact be charming. But here, in Staten Island, amidst the wholesale damage left by Sandy, at least for now, Shabby is Not Chic 🙁

A similar scene: Kind Of