Used with permission The Estate of David Hicks

My spotlight on the essential mid-century decorator David Hicks continues with: Tablescapes. David Hicks not only did beautiful tablescape, he invented the word. He had a philosophy about tablescapes, and I adore it. Quoted in an interview in The Independent, he said:

My passion for arranging masses of things together is part of the way I see objects and use them. It not only looks mean, but is visually meaningless, to have one bottle of gin, one of whisky, a couple of tonic water and a soda syphon on a table in the living-room, even though that might be perfectly adequate for the needs of one evening’s entertainment.

It is perhaps I who have made tablescapes – objects arranged as landscapes on a horizontal surface – into an art form; indeed, I invented the word . . . What is important is not how valuable or inexpensive your objects are, but the care and feeling with which you arrange them. I once bought six inexpensive tin mugs in Ireland and arranged them on a chimneypiece to create an interesting effect in a room which otherwise lacked objects. They stood there in simple perfection.

How to learn to do this? Stare at photos, study and analyze them. Then practice a lot . Fortunately, we have nine more David Hicks tablescapes to help get the studying started — yes, “Simple Perfection” –> Heck yeah there is more →