The Shape of Things to Come : Hard-Edged Minimalism Makes Way for Furniture in Undulating Forms and Baroque Fabrics-- : an Art Nouveau for the 1990s

TODAY’S NEWEST FURNITURE ripples and rolls with soft, undulating profiles: wavy sofa backs, wiggly-legged tables and crescent-shaped chairs. It’s a signal that the hard-edged minimalism that has reigned over interior design for the past three decades is tentatively giving way to curvilinear forms not seen since art nouveau flourished at the last turn-of-the-century.

This new furniture is emerging worldwide, but Southern California designers are in the vanguard of the movement. Jill Sharp-Miller’s Sexy Bunny love seat, with its shimmering fabric and rounded silhouette, epitomizes the free-form style that looks to the future while borrowing heavily from the past. The recamier base and horn-shaped legs are retro touches, but with a lighthearted, Space Age twist. Says Sharp-Miller: “I want people to come home to a sofa that makes them smile.”

Larry Totah, whose small, visionary line has been on the market for three years, believes that “furniture in the ‘90s is warming up. The form is more sumptuous. People want something more romantic, more inviting to sit in.” The undulating contours of his Cake Sofa and Jack Chair recall the work of Barcelona-based, art nouveau architect Antonio Gaudi. On the international scene, French designers Andree Putman and Philippe Starck are introducing baroque--that is, curvaceous and decorative--elements into their work. “It’s something we would both not have done five years ago,” Putman says.

Marie Christine Dorner, a French designer whose work is prominently displayed at the Massini showroom in the Pacific Design Center, decries “the tough, hard-shaped furniture” of the recent past and instead produces designs reminiscent of art nouveau . In describing her lyrical furniture, she says: “Nature is not geometric. When you see a tree or rock, the lines are not straight. I create unusual asymmetrical forms that are not easily understood; they are like the forms in a dream.”

The Ballroom location courtesy of Peter Blazey; Sexy Bunny love seat courtesy of People, Los Angeles.