When you picture the 1980s, what comes to mind? Big hair? Big shoulders? Certainly glamour and excess. But, chances are, in the background there’s a supporting character supplying the atmosphere: Venetian blinds. From American Gigolo to Careless Whisper, the decade’s most memorable cultural moments featured those distinctive lines slicing light and shadow, adding drama to a face or space.
The antithesis to frills and chintz, the blinds spoke of minimalist Manhattan lofts and London warehouse apartments. In short: the future. No one captured that ambience better than the artist Patrick Nagel, whose stylised visuals, combining American aesthetics with art deco elegance and Memphis cool, were used by everyone from Duran Duran to Playboy.
Now, wide-ranging creatives from artist Haegue Yang to multidisciplinary designer Adrian Newcomb, as well as interior-design firms such as Crosby Studios and Not All Architecture, are bringing the graphic slashes back with a thoroughly contemporary twist that nods to their 1980s roots.
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Eduardo Mediero, the founder of architectural firm Hanghar, sees the appeal in using an often-overlooked product such as blinds in an unexpected way, saying: ‘That kind of reinterpretation feels very of-the-moment.’ Mediero wrapped the inside of a 1970s Madrid apartment with exterior blinds that, he says, ‘gave us the chance to use them like a façade element, rather than just a shading device. These are wider and sturdier, and have a compelling industrial quality.
Placing them in a residential context gave the space an unexpected edge.’ As the blinds create shifting, dynamic patterns of shadow throughout the day, they add ‘an almost cinematic quality to interiors. They give a space rhythm and texture from both inside and out’.
Hitch Derras, associate designer at David Collins Studio, agrees: ‘When blinds are used, light becomes a material in its own right.’ This allows a designer to choreograph its brightness, texture and direction. More than just a window treatment, Derras sees blinds as ‘architectural instruments that shape how we move and feel within a space’; the studio used them in its Delaire Graff villa project in South Africa.
‘The 80s’ love affair with Venetian blinds resonates here, not through nostalgia, but in spirit,’ he says. ‘The way shadows drape across art, elongating at dusk, channels that era’s seductive drama – yet our approach is more intentional: less about retro flair, more about light as a living force. Blinds can totally shift a room’s character.’
Adding privacy without total separation, the soft grid of a blind frames a view with intention, shifting the focus inward while maintaining a connection to the outdoors. ‘They simultaneously partially obscure and reveal, so the outlook becomes more intriguing,’ says Mediero. ‘You’re aware of the world outside, but it’s abstracted. It encourages you to look more carefully.’
Vazio Architects’ Carlos Teixeira values the versatility of Venetian blinds and the way in which they interact with and respond to the sun. He uses them to protect interiors from excessive sunlight and enhance the exterior architecture of a building, explaining: ‘Protection from the sun becomes a formal and aesthetic feature. In this sense, they define the architecture.’
It’s no surprise that versatile Venetian blinds are enjoying a long- overdue comeback: they’re tough but playful, functional but mysterious. ‘When used floor-to-ceiling and wall-to-wall, they have a sculptural quality,’ notes Derras. For Mediero, ‘they carry a strong visual language – the ability to filter light and obscure views. It’s a design element that can do a lot with very little’.
