Gilt complex: decoding the new interior design of the Oval Office
An audience with the President and his inner circle in the remodelled White House is designed to make visitors feel disoriented, mute and acquiescent. A neuroscientist explains
We saw a lot of the inside of the White House in Washington DC over the holiday period. Reporters and cameras constantly found their way into the Oval Office. Much of the design encountered there does not warm the cockles of my neuroscientist heart.
I’ve never been inside the Oval Office myself, but the abundant TV images and news photographs indicate that – from the perspective of environmental psychology – the space is challenged in the following ways:
The shine factor is very, very high. Humans prefer shiny surfaces to matte ones, some think because the sort of water hole that would have sustained our species when young would have been shiny when seen from a distance, but increasing the concentration of shiny things beyond a few accent pieces here and there, maybe a mirror, is so energising that it can push many people into a mental wasteland of poorly functioning brain synapses. The number of gilded elements in the Oval Office, decorative elements and tchotchkes of various sorts seems to justify sunglasses.
It lacks potted plants. Sure, there’s a view of assorted natural stuff through the windows, but there aren’t plants in most of the sightlines through the office. Plants are pretty much a given in offices today (except those of allergy doctors) because seeing them has been shown over and over again to elevate cognitive performance in general and creativity specifically, while helping to beat back mental exhaustion. Plus, people like looking at them. Nature art would help compensate for this lack of plants, but art depicting nature scenes also seems to be absent.
Monumental complexity
Its visual complexity is monumental. Humans thrive in spaces with moderate visual complexity. Things such as the number of colours, patterns, and different sorts of objects in a space, and the apparent order with which they are arranged, all contribute to visual complexity. Residential interiors designed by Frank Lloyd Wright have moderate visual complexity, and if you mentally compare the living room of any Wright home with the Oval Office it becomes clear that the Oval Office wins any complexity contest hands down. Winning in this case is not desirable as stress levels increase with visual complexity and stress diverts mental energy from the activity at hand, degrading cognitive performance.
The scale of the space is intimidating. The height of the walls in the Oval Office has been the same for a very long time, but now the visitor’s eye is drawn to the ceiling, particularly by the amount of new and eye-catching gold decoration on the ceiling mouldings and the ceiling itself—all of which increases apparent scale and is quite intimidating.
It is very formal. Which may be very good because formality keeps people on their better behaviour, although formality can stifle spontaneity and cordiality. The symmetry and ceiling height help reinforce this effect. Colour placement is also challenging: we are most comfortable when the darkest colour in a space is under our feet, the lightest one is overhead, and intermediate shades cover walls. The carpet in the Oval Office is white/beige, as are the walls and ceiling.
Associations to gold will drive experience. I leave you to your own thoughts about seeing lots of metallic gold, but for many, shiny gold is not a plus. It signals, for example, an attempt by the person responsible for that gold to overcome negative feelings and to signal their worth, to themselves and others; a lack of style or design expertise; or something else entirely.
Stunned into silence
All is not awful with the design of the Oval Office, neuropsychologically. For example, there are through window views of greenery and natural materials such as wood are used on floors and furniture, both of which can have some desirable effects on stress levels, for instance.
However, the many photos and videos available to the general public showing people in the Oval Office perched on the front edges of their seats and not comfortably resting against the cushions on the backs of their chairs makes clear the state that the current design of the Oval Office induces in many users – one in which visitors are stressed, hyper-stimulated, and somewhat dehumanised. All of which is designed to stun visitors into silence and acquiescence.
Offices can be designed with different objectives in mind. We generally assume that they are developed to do things such as support collaborative exchanges and positive outcomes. Perhaps we can conclude this was not the intent of those responsible for the Oval Office’s redesign—in which case, those designers may have succeeded.
