STOP TRYING TO HAVE GOOD TASTE
What if trying to have good taste is exactly what is killing your own?
There is something slightly strange about the way we talk about taste now. Everyone wants it, everyone wants to be seen as having it, and somehow we have become very good at recognizing the things that are supposed to count as “good taste.” The right designer. The right furniture. The right film. The right restaurant. The right shade of brown. The right pair of shoes. Scroll long enough and you'll start noticing the same references everywhere, presented as if they were discoveries we all somehow made independently. And maybe that's the problem. We have never had more access to culture, yet it has never been easier to develop the exact same taste as everyone else. The internet gives us an endless supply of things to look at, but it also gives us an endless supply of opinions about what is worth looking at. Something becomes cool, then everyone knows it's cool, then everyone starts liking it, and eventually we're not even sure whether we liked it before we were told to. I think we forget that taste is supposed to be a little irrational. You should be allowed to love something you can't explain. You should be allowed to think something “iconic” is boring. You should be allowed to wear the strange jacket, buy the ugly lamp, listen to the song nobody is talking about, or become completely obsessed with something that would never make it onto a perfectly curated moodboard. Because the moment everything you like has to be approved, your taste stops being yours. It becomes a collection of references you've learned are safe. And safe taste can be beautiful, but it is rarely interesting. The people with the most interesting style don't always seem interested in proving that they have any. They aren't constantly trying to look expensive, effortless, cultured or cool. They just notice things. They collect references without necessarily turning them into an identity. They can love minimalism and maximalism. They can wear something incredibly simple one day and completely ridiculous the next. They don't need every choice to belong to the same aesthetic. Maybe that's because real taste isn't about consistency. It's about curiosity. It's knowing what makes you stop. It's being able to look at something and have a reaction before checking whether everyone else agrees with you. It's changing your mind. It's going down a rabbit hole because one photograph reminded you of another photograph from twenty years ago. It's discovering a designer nobody around you knows and becoming obsessed with their work for no particular reason. It's finding something beautiful in a place where you're not supposed to find it. And maybe most importantly, it's being able to say, “I like this,” without needing to explain why. We're living in a time when everything can become an aesthetic, and I think that's making us forget how strange taste is supposed to be. Your taste doesn't need to be a perfectly edited Pinterest board. It doesn't need to match your wardrobe, your apartment, your Instagram feed and the person you're trying to become. It can be contradictory. It can be embarrassing. It can change completely. It can contain things that make absolutely no sense together. In fact, maybe that's how you know it's yours. So stop trying to have good taste. Stop choosing things because they look like the kind of things a person with good taste would choose. Stop asking whether something is timeless, cool, tasteful or worth posting. Ask a much simpler question: do I actually like it? And if the answer is yes, that's probably enough. Because maybe the goal was never to develop perfect taste.
Maybe it was to develop enough confidence to stop borrowing everyone else's.
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