The Wall Street Journal - 22.02.2020 - 23.02.2020

D12| Saturday/Sunday, February 22 - 23, 2020 **** THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

DESIGN & DECORATING

THE OTHER DAYI wanted to sit

down on the sofa, but as usual

one of my husband’s guitars was

lounging there. It was not part of

the décor.

As a thoughtful spouse, I de-

cided to bring the instrument to

him in the garage, which we have

recently turned into “an office” to

which he has been banished not

only because he is a pest during

my working hours. He was

evicted from the main house be-

cause of his guitars. When we

married, he had two. Now he has

too many.

I squeezed open the garage’s

side door, pushed an old amplifier

out of the way and gingerly tip-

toed across a jungle floor of elec-

trical cords. My husband was

seated in front of a table that

looked like it had a guitar neck

built into it.

“What the hell is that?” I asked,

still surprised after all these

years.

“It’s a pedal steel,” he said,

beaming.

“Don’t tell me you bought an-

other guitar,” I said.

“No, no, no,” he said quickly. “I

borrowed it from Steinberg.”

I looked at him, conveying

through subtle ESP my displea-

sure.

“That’s why I put the other gui-

tar on the couch,” he said. “To

make room for this,” he added

helpfully. “Because it’s getting

kind of crowded in here.”

I have been battling the guitar

problem for years—guitars on the

sofa, guitars in the kitchen, gui-

tars on the bed, guitars in the

bathroom. Guitars tripping me

when I walk through a room. And

now, despite all efforts to contain

them in the garage, they are mul-

tiplying like Tribbles.

We’ve all been in homes that

got overwhelmed by people’s

quirky collections: painted lead

soldiers from the Napoleonic wars,

carved owls or vinyl records no

one plays any more. How do

I prevent that from happening at

my house?

good thing because it allows him

to express creativity in ways he

couldn’t before.”

“Yes, but he can only play one

instrument at a time,” I said.

“That’s why I have only one grand

piano, and by the way I keep it

tucked away discreetly in a guest

bedroom. Why does he need

so many?”

“There’s a lot of meaning that

gets attached to objects,” Dr.

Whitbourne said. “And if some-

body has a lot of stuff, the best

way to intervene is to work to-

gether to find a solution that

doesn’t make him feel bad.”

“You mean, instead of hinting

that he has a problem?” I asked.

“I guess I could try that.”

“Try positive reinforcement,”

she said. “Help him find a more

appropriate way to store them.”

In other words, take something

that could be a décor problem and

turn it into a feature.

But how? I studied a guitar that

was propped against my desk.

Lacquered wood, shapely swan

neck—it was a visually pleasing

object. Yet it would not be enough

to get wall hooks and hang his

half dozen guitars in a row; I don’t

want it to look like we live in a

music store.

For this I needed professional

advice.

“You want to make the guitars

look like they are jewelry, adorn-

ing a room,” said Lisa Ellis, an in-

terior designer in Athens, Ga. “If

you hang them, think of them like

art and arrange them so they look

good proportionally next to each

other.”

Even more important, she said,

is to make the other elements of a

room complement the musical in-

struments. “Guitars have so much

texture, and it’s good to play off

that by using jewel-tone colors

and other rich textures in the

room, like grass cloth on a wall,

plush velvet on a sofa or a wool

carpet,” she said.

For clients who own several

guitars (plus a mandolin, ukulele

and banjo) Ms. Ellis is designing a

music room that also has armless

chairs and sofas. “That makes it

easier to play them than if you are

sitting in a club chair where you

can get carpal tunnel because you

have to hold your arms weirdly,”

she said.

These were good ideas. But

would I have to completely redeco-

rate the house around the guitars?

“All you have to do is pair the

guitars with your piano,” said

Laura Hodges, a Maryland-based

interior designer whom I called

next. “Think of the guitars as sup-

porting players. Put one or two on

stands next to the piano and a

piece of artwork over it so every-

thing’s connected. Then you’ll

have a music room.”

“A music room,” I repeated.

It was a genius idea.

I love my piano. From the

Steinway piano factory where it

was built more than a hundred

years ago in Astoria, New York, it

traveled to Chicago in 1916 to be

sold, arriving just in time to grace

the showroom floor during the

grand opening of Lyon & Healy’s

new downtown store. It is a beau-

tiful instrument and deserves

more than to be consigned to the

corner of a guest bedroom, as if it

were an afterthought.

When I hung up, I went to find

my husband. “How would you like

a music room for your guitars?”

Iasked him.

“In the main house?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

To transform the space from a

guest room with a piano into a mu-

sic room with a bed in the corner,

I’ll attach three guitar hangers to

the wall (including one for my hus-

band’s ukulele—yes, of course he

has one), put two more of his

“axes” on stands next to the piano

and place an armless chair next to a

music stand. Luckily, it’s a big room.

But the pedal steel thing still

needs to go back to Steinberg.

A MATTER OF LIFE AND DÉCOR/ MICHELLE SLATALLA

When Your Husband’s Hobby

Takes Over the House

JOHN TOMAC

HistoryWhile rummaging in a

flea market 30 years ago, Ted

Muehling, a New York designer

of unfussy jewelry and decora-

tive objects, picked up a 19th-

century candlestick. “Its shape

was so simple and elegant,” said

Mr. Muehling, “right away I

thought of reinterpreting it as

something both classical and

modernist.”

AllureThe 19 different candle-

sticks ($162 to $1,515 aterbut-

ler.com) are based on three de-

sign motifs from Europe’s

Biedermeier period (1815–1848):

an egg, an attenuated rod and a

trumpet form. Forged in various

metals, often with semiprecious

materials such as agate, quartz

and fossilized ivory, they have a

sinuous, timeless quality that

won’t quarrel with most décor.

Another draw: Candlelight, said

Mr. Muehling, “makes everyone

and every room beautiful.”

FansGwyneth Paltrow, the Sul-

tan of Brunei and lighting de-

signer Lindsey Adelman, who

bartered one of her fixtures for a

set in gold and bronze.

Cult MomentIna Garten fea-

tures hers in tablescapes on her

Food Network show “Barefoot

Contessa.” As she put it, they

“always look like a party.”

—Lexi Mainland

Why collectors’

passion for

Ted Muehling’s

Biedermeier

candle holders

never flames out

LUCY HAN

CULT FOLLOWING

Stately

Sticks

“I just want to sit on my sofa in

peace,” I said to psychologist Su-

san Krauss Whitbourne, an emer-

ita professor at the University of

Massachusetts Amherst whom I

called for advice. “But my hus-

band’s guitars are taking over the

furniture. This can’t be good for

our marriage.”

“Without knowing anything

about your husband, I don’t know

if this is a phase or if he plans to

keep them forever,” she said.

“He’s joined a dad band,” I said

darkly.

“Oh, I see,” Dr. Whitbourne

said. “Well, that’s ultimately a

As visually pleasing as

guitars are, I don’t want

our home to look like we

live in a music store. I

needed professional help.

F. MARTIN RAMIN/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, STYLING BY ANNE CARDENAS

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