An iterative process
Life is messy. It's not straight forward. It's iterative.
My experience as a creative has been anything but a linear process.
When I was young I used to think that most people knew what they wanted, went for it and it was a straight path.
For most, life is anything but. Especially today. Career stability doesn't really exist. The world is changing too fast.
When you are a creative, you never nail a project. You get a lot of things right but there is no perfect project. There's just completing the project and hoping to get things "more right" on the next one.
George Martin, the iconic producer of the Beatles (often referred to as the 5th Beatle) was speaking to John Lennon years after the band's breakup.
Lennon remarked to him he wish he could re-record everything the Beatles recorded, to which Martin exclaimed, "Even Strawberry Fields!?," his favorite song.
Lennon responds, "Especially Strawberry Fields."
The sooner we all get comfortable with this, the better.
I've been in NYC for the last 36 hours filming a brand shoot and checking in on the Brooklyn renovation I've been working on.
Yesterday at the shoot, where I was interacting with a bed & bedding, the Creative Director kept changing the bed, the way the duvet laid, adding a sheet, changing a blanket, removing a side table.
Again and again until we got the shot mostly right.
This is how life is. You set it up and it looks great. Then you tweak it. And tweak it again. And get it mostly right.
And then move on to the next project.
Tamsin Johnson and Kelly Wearstler, mega designers and two of my faves, have both said in their own ways that every space should have imperfections.
If it's too perfect and curated, it loses soul.
They've also both said that any great project takes time and iteration.
If that space is your house, you continue to work on it. Furniture wears out, things break, photos fade, styles change, you change.
It's iterative. And you don't make all the iterations. Sometimes the world does.
I saw this on my morning walk.
This sidewalk is not perfect nor how the pourer intended, but it's undoubtedly better:
I posted yesterday about unlacquered brass. I really dig this.
The house we were filming in was full of it.
It is not a stable material. It ages. It changes over time. There is nothing about it that's "perfect."
But it's great.
That's how life is.
We show up. We have faith in the process. We put forward our best effort. We nail some things. We make some mistakes. We learn.
We move on to the next project.
We iterate.
