Nice Things For Good Life

Why aesthetic innovation is the backbone of the modern brand strategy

This post was written before the current crisis, and now seems prescient. It looks into how the fragility of the modern aspiration leads us to find fulfillment in the mundane. It was something I felt we were going towards anyway, and this crisis accelerated it.

Nice Things is a monthly that features items like Hina dolls and rice bowls, photographed against a clean, monochromatic backdrop. There are also images of people cooking, foraging, farming. Everything is simple, artisanal, understated, wholesome. It promotes “good life with nice things.”

There are more periodicals like this. Ordinary is a fine art photography quarterly focused exclusively on creative riffs on a single everyday object (cabinets, a mop, a sink). &Premium is a “guide to a better life.” It is dedicated to artisanal coffee roasters, hand-crafted knives, flower bouquets, and ceramic bowls. There are entire pages on a “nice scent,” “spring bouquet,” “beautiful shoes.”

What links them is their focus on the ordinary. “The ability to see great beauty in the everyday objects around you is a rare and precious gift.” For this, thank (or blame) our post-growth age. Climate emergency, global pandemic, aging population, and the new cultural, social, and environmental capital create new sources…