In Defense of LLL
Live, Laugh, Love, and design merits of text-based decoration
Not since the post-war advent of mass-produced figural cookie jars, has a domestic object come to signify the pursuit of the sweet life as much as ‘Live Laugh Love’ decorative signage. And not since the 90s Mackenzie Childs checkerboard kettle, has an object for the home also come to symbolize ‘basic’ taste.
It is in this polarity, between LLL’s positive and negative design influences that I find it fascinating to think about. It’s my belief that these three simple words deserve further inspection for their untapped potential value in the arena of ‘high design’. After all, cliches are universal truths, and the most inspirational interiors should be those that encourage us to move to the top of Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs to self-actualization: the purpose and meaning of life.
Isn’t the difference between a house and home ultimately those spaces where one can be truly whole, to live each day to the fullest, to embrace love, and to find joy in the everyday?
First written in the poem “Success” by Bessie Anderson Stanley in 1904, “He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much", the message was paraphrased to its three word essence a century later before entering into the popular consciousness sometime in the early 2000s, by way of mass market, big box store ‘art’.
In the last decade, LLL slowly gained momentum to become one of the most popular mottos of recent times. The phrase "Live, Laugh, Love" has appeared on framed posters, wall decals, ornaments, cushions, mugs, linens, jewelry and even on coffins. Google Trends shows that searches for the phrase peaked between 2009 and 2014 in the United States, in the aftermath of the great recession of 2008. Whether a fan or foe, one cannot deny LLL’s influence on mainstream American design culture. As reported by journalist Madeleine Pollard in her piece ‘The Trite Stuff: The Rise and Fall of “Live, Laugh, Love”’, the popularity of the expression may reveal our need for more inspirational quotes to combat the deluge of negative news cycles feeding us a constant loop of disasters and catastrophes.
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In our increasingly sarcastic, black-mirror society, Gen Z’s proliferation of Karen ‘starter pack’ memes almost always include LLL art to evoke an inauthentic, American middle-class fancy aesthetic that we are expected to cringe at the sight of. In youth culture specifically, LLL is pejoratively associated with a basic Boomer style of decor, and has become a mainstream saying specifically designed to insult one’s design taste. Popular Tik Tok influencer mrphoenixgrey’s calls LLL and other “word art” the “the absolute cardinal sin of interior design.” I respectfully disagree.
For me, the cardinal sin in design today is confusing irony with authenticity. It appears that mrphoenixgrey and his 850K followers would much rather Die-Cry-Hate before developing their own unique POV. As a designer or design enthusiast, if one doesn’t stand for LLL, it would be more beneficial to find a mantra that speaks to you rather than to criticize one that brings many other people joy. There is so much noise on social media from the self-proclaimed judges on bad taste, how about focusing on authentically contributing new ideas for what is good taste?
Scroll further on Tik Tok or Instagram, and you’ll find the algorithm wants us to believe that tasteful interiors are those beiged-out, flattened rooms designed for the camera, rather than spaces in support of the individual lives of its inhabitants. How did anemic rooms that lack humanity become packaged as tasteful, when by definition flavor can’t exist without life?
To discredit the potency of LLL as just a capitalist-manufactured, generic expression is a miscalculation of its significance on design culture. One would be challenged to find a more important design motto to define the aspirations of 21st century living, and the yearning for a happy home. Yes, it is a mass-produced and mass-marketed message, but the American Dream coded decorative signage is not a plebeian surrogate for spiritualism. It’s a fine-tuned mantra for our generation’s obsessive search for mood and vibes.
Those of us who work in the interior design industry, who are participating in the continuum of decorative art history, may benefit from reconsidering LLL and the merits of other text-based decoration. Dare I say, there is a profound opportunity to reconsider LLL as a call to action for designers who are tasked to create livable beauty. What I’m suggesting here is a reclaiming of ‘Live Laugh Love’ as a design touchstone on par with “form follows function.”
At core, LLL is a window into today’s society, a yearning call for a return to gratitude and appreciation of life experienced in the physical world, away from the dystopian, terminally online, doom-scrolling activity that is filled with saccharine displays of lives well-lived only for the double tap.
Understandably, the issue that design-minded people have with LLL may not be with the message itself, but rather the execution of the artworks and decor objects currently available, which are more often than not cheaply executed.
But rather than looking away with disapproval, what if upper echelons of design talent elevated LLL, as well as other inspirational quotes for that matter (remember Successories motivational posters of the 90s?), into the realm of collectible design?
As a fan of text-based art, from the likes of Ruscha, Kruger, Wool, Holzer, Ligon, Wynne, and Emin, I often wonder why there is no current decorative art equivalent to this fine art genre. You will not find a single interior in popular design publications with text-based furnishings or textiles. To illustrate this idea, the closest example I could find is an early 2000's Muriel Brandolini interior with walls in Holland & Sherry felt, hand-beaded pills by Trinh Ly Quynh Kim bearing lyrics from Lou Reed's "Perfect Day". Brandolini has consistently been ahead of her time with her interiors, and I believe this text-based room is a standout in her inspiring designography.
From a design industry perspective, why is it that there are infinite wings of fabrics in design centers across the country in every pattern one can imagine except words as pattern? The last time text was embraced in elegant interiors were on needlepoint pillows of the waspy home style. Isn’t it interesting that the word textile and text have a clear etymological root, yet the two are rarely if ever brought together in interior design.
Why can’t inspirational quotes and positive affirmations like LLL be contextualized through fine design? Can we lift Live Laugh Love from poorly made home accessories to artisan-made objet d’art?
Dear designers and makers: Let’s turn the beat around on LLL and other text-based motifs for interiors, can we?
Thinking for living,
Sean
Brand Utility
Some ideas for Live, Laugh, Love in fine design to spark conversation:
Lessage couture LLL embroidered curtains for Peter Marino.
Jacques Garcia LLL gaufrage chair.
Verre églomisé LLL screen by artist Miriam Ellner for Brian McCarthy.
Kamp Studios walls with plaster-imbedded LLL for Kelly Wearstler.
Fortuny block-printed LLL fabric for Chahan Minassian.
