Our first feature film! Reader Marybeth — who has written several garden posts for the blog — created this text-to-video movie featuring Dick and Midge. Just the latest in our 2011 campaign to: Resist the Greige Nation. Thank you, Marybeth!
Dick and Midge resist the greige nation
Our first feature film! Reader Marybeth — who has written several garden posts for the blog — created this text-to-video movie featuring Dick and Midge. Just the latest in our 2011 campaign to: Resist the Greige Nation. Thank you, Marybeth!
MbS says
Teresa,
Love learning the word history. The original French denotation makes me think immediately of the lovely nubby texture of raw silk and even the variable strands in Duponi silk.
Mb
MbS says
Hi Dave,
The speech generators do produce oddities, which I hope, can be part of the charm. I still hear “Midge.” And, Dick would never say that. 🙂
Shane says
Not with a name like that, he wouldn’t!
Dave says
Am I the only one who heard “bitch” instead of Midge at the beginning and at :32 during the the video?
Teresa Halpert says
(closet linguist here…)
First, I love this little movie. Yes! “I fear we have crossed over to greige.”
But second, I’m not sure we’re keeping the entire “greige” picture in mind. It sounds like a portmanteau of “gray” and “beige”, and I think that IS one of the meanings (i.e. that color that is gray/beige or in that family). But originally it is from the French “grege”–“raw”, as in raw (undyed or unfinished) silk; related to the Italian “greggio,” which is “crude” or unrefined oil.
So it refers to the subtle colors of unbleached and undyed fabrics. If you google “greige” and “eco friendly” together, you will see lots of links about how certain companies are committed to “eco-friendly untreated greige goods.” I think this earth-friendly persona, and not just the visual appeal of the colors, is part of the hipster thing for greige. The greige-suduced feel that they are doing their part to save the planet.
Not to wade too far into politics in such a friendly, nonpolitical venue, but I think the retrorenovators are as eco-friendly as anybody. In embracing our beautiful colors, we can point out that we conserve the past, saving many old AND STILL COLORFUL things from landfills. (We are oh-so-hip in our own way.)
Shane says
I don’t think people put that much thought into it, and think they are saving the planet because they are choosing blah.
It’s more because it’s 1. “New” 2. “In style” and 3. On TV. Also, that it’s almost all you can get without being resourceful like we are, decorating with color, the way life should be.
Our part for eco friendly is like you pointed out – we are reusing, restoring and recycling. Although my primary concern is building my time machine!