As per Le Parisien, it is "a simultaneous reaction to minimalism and to neo-expressionist maximalism" which "employs the most centrist point of view available in order to create a project most thoroughly in sync with the average paradigm of the relevant... context".
Enough Fancy Talk; What Does It Mean?
It means that there is a scale of design that ranges from the pared-down, basic aesthetic of minimalism, where the focus is on providing the absolute bare least a person can get by with; and the layered, complex 'more is more' indulgence of maximalism. And somewhere by itself near the middle, lonely and sad, is medialism.
Medialism is the pursuit of a happy medium between those two extremes, uncomfortable with being too close to either.
Minimalism is the idea that having too many things in a space obscure the grace and elegance of clean lines and simple shapes. Minimalists don't view the practice as stark or boring, instead preferring the serenity and lack of sensory stimulation that can overwhelm.
Rigid adherence to absolute tidiness and organization is intrinsic to the concept, and frankly put, it's inconvenient, unless you have paid staff who do nothing but clean up after you all day. However, it must be said that life is easier and cheaper when you're buying as little as possible for your home.
On the other pole, we have maximalism. It's a lavish celebration of... well, everything, all at once. Maximalism seeks to include as much as possible of as much as possible. They don't see it as hoarding or clutter, but rather as being surrounded by things that stimulate and please with a glut of sensory stimulation. They enjoy the luxury of having not just enough but plenty. It can be expensive and in an interesting twist on minimalism's difficulty keeping so determinedly neat all the time, it can be just as hard keeping so much stuff clean.
Medialists see the cons of the other two and decide they outweigh the pros. Minimalism feels empty, barren, bland, and kind of sad; maximalism makes them feel jittery at the barrage of sensory information blasting them, and wonder about how much dusting and vacuuming it takes to keep so much stuff clean.
Medialists seek a happy spot between the two. They don't want a jumbled cacophony of patterns and colors and items layered over each other, without any blank space around or between any of it. They also don't want nothing but blank space and unsaturated shades of concrete and oatmeal. They want some breathing room around their stuff, but they want some stuff, too. Not all the stuff, but some. More than minimalism's bare essentials, and less than maximalism's yes-please profusion.
I've found a few mentions of 'maximal minimalism' but that seems to refer more to minimalist lines and quantities with maximalist colors and patterns, than it does to a true compromise between the two: there's still extreme simplicity and spareness, it's just really bright. This too-brief snippet does, at least, provide an interesting graph representation of the results of their poll asking whether readers preferred the mini life, the maxi life, or something in between.
So where do we find more about medialism? It's very hard to find anything-- articles, blog posts, anything-- on it. The narrative focuses exclusively on minimalism or maximalism, with no mention that anything in-between might be desireable or even possible. The Wall Street Journal had a good article about it a few years ago, but that seems to be it.
Odd, isn't it? Especially when that graph above seems to hint pretty strongly that the lion's share of people are most comfortable with a moderate style lying somewhere between the two extremes.
This article refers to it as "happy-medium design", as does another by the same author a few years later. With that search term, I was able to find one more here and here but neither give very concrete examples or suggestions on how to achieve it.
This article features the tagline, "If you've ever had trouble nailing down your personal decor style, Ukranian interior designer Pavel Vetrov may have just the room for you" and showcases rooms he designed that are literally split down the middle, with one side utterly minimal and the other completely maximal.
And I understand the point of it, but mostly it just makes me cranky-- instead of going to the effort of creating a single room split cleanly down the middle with both styles, why not just create a room that balances elements of both?
Conclusion
So I guess what this means is that there's a puzzling dearth of advice and guidance for the multitude-- dare I say majority-- of us who want a livable Goldilocks home that avoids having too much or not enough and instead is just right. Since it's a concept I hold dearly and embrace for my own home, I'll be featuring and mentioning the concept prominently on this blog. I can only hope it somehow reaches those of you who are interested in the issue and need some tips on how to achieve it for yourselves.
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