The fourth season of AMC's drama Mad Men premiered on Sunday, and watching it -- as more people did than ever before in the show's history -- was a highly pleasurable aesthetic experience, one that bathed viewers in a kind of hazy comfort. Because despite little clear advancement to the plot, the new episode brought an amplification of that thing at which Mad Men already excelled -- that same thing that Tom Ford brought to A Single Man, and which Luca Guadagnino offers in I Am Love: the imbuing of everything from the fashion, to the architecture, to all aspects of the art and design with an undeniable, inescapable, meticulous aesthetic seductiveness.
For art, fashion, and design highlights, visit ARTINFO's Mad Men slideshow.
As Don Draper and his crew moved into the year 1964 and the Time-Life building (thankfully without depriving the animated credit sequence of its Mies van der Rohe Seagram-ian facade) audiences were left to admire the Technicolor modernist furniture filling the rooms of the team's supposedly humbler offices. From Knoll-inspired chairs (like those designed in the 1950s by Saarinen and Risom) to that heavenly Eames executive desk seat, production designer Dan Bishop continues to shine. The attention to the minutia of graphic elements, like period-appropriate fonts, seem right on the money as well. (Though not appropriate enough for some bloggers, who literally document when Don's minions incorrectly dot an "i.")
While ARTINFO is ill-equipped to referee typography feuds, we can appreciate the show's elegant treatment of art -- from Bert Cooper's unveiling of his Rothko painting to his delightfully lewd Hokusai print in past seasons. Finally, the fashion speaks for itself. Mastermind costume designer Jamie Bryant makes everyone want to wear her creations. (Banana Republic has even introduced a "casting call" contest for one lucky shopper to win a cameo on the show.) The women's style is immaculate, too, of course: Just look at Betty Draper's cashmere sweater sets. Lana Turner never worked a look better.
-Emma Allen
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And perhaps you should give an art direction career a try if you think it's so easy to design sets to replicate an era.
But that you would seriously compare the writing on Desperate Housewives with that of Mad Men is really the most curious comment of all.