When it comes to design and decoration, it feels extremely tricky and dangerous

to accuse anyone of having bad taste, or to pride oneself on having good taste.

The official story is that anything goes, and no one knows what's good or bad anyway.

But that seems too easy and lacking in ambition.

Progress can in fact be made on this important issue,

if we try to understand what psychological mechanisms govern the business of taste in the first place.

Why do we have the taste we have?

Why are we attracted or repelled by certain sorts of styles?

The best way to interpret this, is via a theory of compensation.

We're all a bit unbalanced inside and get attracted to styles in the world,

that promise to compensate us for the things that we're lacking within.

So, for example, people who feel chaotic, undisciplined and cluttered inside,

are liable to be very drawn to interiors that are serene, pure and poised.

Equally, people who are very exposed to and oppressed by the brutal tempo of modern life,

with its excessive brutality, precision and technological war,

are likely to be drawn to styles that speak of the rustic, the natural, and the cozily shabby.

Now that might be an explanation for taste, but what about bad taste?

What singles out instances of bad taste, is excess in some direction or another.

Bad taste is a massive over - compensation which has been generated

by a sharp shortfall in some area or another.

It's a response to a psychological or physical trauma.