Darling there's a peacock on our carpet...
Close up of taxidermy peacock in
the home of interior designer
Jeffrey Bilhuber
Faux taxidermy horns
surround the television in
Jeffrey Bilhuber's home
surround the television in
Jeffrey Bilhuber's home
A friend of mine, Alexandra, is a very smart and savvy woman. She has a successful business doing high quality finishes - faux and otherwise. She is up-to-the minute on decorating and interior design trends. She left New Orleans after Katrina, but returns periodically to service her accounts here.
She and her mother and new 9 month old daughter paid me a visit. We spent the afternoon having lunch and sweets and shopping on Magazine Street, truly Soho Nola. I showed her a favorite store of mine, Perch, one that has opened post Katrina, one that is very much a part of the new nola style.
She of course loved it, and in particular she went absolutely crazy for what I thought was a very unusual item: a full size stuffed (taxidermy) white peacock (around $3,000.). We were told by the very sweet store manager that the stuffed white peacock is the white hot item du jour on the decor scene.
I am no stranger to stuffed birds. My daddy was a hunter, and one of my favorite childhood playthings was a stuffed pheasant - it had the softest feathers. My friend Sharonne Einhorn, co-owner of Ruby Beets collected taxidermy of all kinds. I purchased a couple of stuffed crows from Ruby Beets, thinking they would fall under the guise of Victorian specimen collecting, fitting in with my English Country decor. They ended up in Key West as a hostess gift to a friend who has a home called "Crow Cottage".
Lately I do not understand the love affair decorators are having with horns. Many are fake, not taxidermy ones, made of resin. They are just everywhere, on everyone's walls. And now huge peacocks. What do you think of this decor trend? Does it leave you as puzzled as I am?
Jeffrey Bilhuber's home
Jeffrey Bilhuber Interior Design HERE
The Peak of Chic (via NYSD) showed
some of these photos HERE
There were alot of comments, but no one
said anything about the peacock!
Taxidermy peacock in a period style room
I find anything stuffed, that was once alive, ghastly. What's next people? Yuck. I doubt that those peacooks are living out their lives til they fall over from a natural death to serve their makabre future as props. I definitly prefer them alive, decorating the landscape.
ReplyDeleteWe had a lot of small farm animals growing up and my mother would send some of the hides of the poor creatures, that had become dinner, to a tanner and place them around the house on chairs, sofas, etc. Once she had the nerve to do this to my favorite bunny. I still don't know what is was she was upset with me about. I had that fur all these years until Mozart took a liking to it as a puppy.
Some people would require therapy for a childhood like mine.... haha
hi very fine, thanks for your long and eloquent post. i wonder if we forget the connection to the living thing, when we buy it in a store or on eBay, like i didn't kill it, it's dead already, so what's the diff if i decorate with it. i guess that's why the horn craze is now mainly fuled with fake ones. it's funny that fake flowers and fake trees are the biggest decorating no-no. maybe fake horns pave the way for fake peacocks LOL i think fake flowers can never be totally redeemed, though many decorators sneak them in there LOL
ReplyDelete