![]() This spring, at the semiannual Southern Furniture Market in High Point, N.C., there were several secrets of the smaller sort. ''That thick heavy bookcase that separates the room from the rest of the house becomes a very special threshold.'' ''When you walk into a secret room, you feel as though you're walking into another world,'' says the architect. ![]() Yudell, the security of a hidden compartment is almost secondary to its psychological and romantic appeal. ''Some people have found themselves walking into a closet.'' He also uses the classic short drawer, in which a hidden space is concealed behind a drawer that appears to be full depth.įor Mr. ''People sometimes wonder where the bathroom is,'' Mr. The Los Angeles architect Robert Yudell of Moore Ruble Yudell admits to designing at least one house with a hidden room, and in his own Santa Monica home has built a movable bookcase in front of the bathroom. ''Any good cabinetmaker can make secret compartments,'' Mr. Simon, who says, ''There are all types of new hardware which lend themselves to secret compartments, like Murphy- bed hardware systems and TV extension chassis.''Įspecially with the renewed interest in molding and paneling among some architects, there is greater opportunity for building secret compartments. ![]() ''People are intrigued by movement,'' he says, ''things that slide and swivel.'' The mechanical aspect of moving parts is also interesting to Mr. Simon believes secret places have a wide appeal. Simon says, adding, ''When I've made suggestions for a secret compartment for the homes of my clients, most have accepted.'' ''In my particular case, these compartments are not so secret, since they're the first part of the house I show off it's where I hide the Christmas presents,'' Mr. By chamfering the corners of the room with swiveling bookcases, he created leftover spaces. In the extensive remodeling of his own home, Mark Simon, a partner in Moore Grover Harper, an Essex, Conn., architectural firm, created secret compartments in a square room that he converted into an octagon. He and his associates have built secret rooms in a number of houses. Jackson might have been a magician, the Los Angeles architect Charles Moore designs houses with an intentional sense of surprise and discovery, and talks of buildings in terms of their magic. Changes of style in architecture and design during the last 10 years have also produced side effects that have meant a re-emergence of secrecy for some designers. ![]() Historic preservation of houses and antique furniture reproductions have reintroduced an awareness of hidden passages and compartments. ''Now, with the reappearance of people doing special furniture,'' he says, ''secret compartments are starting to show up again.''Īlong with the re-emergence of craft, there have been two other factors behind the reappearance of secret places. In addition, a mass- produced desk with a secret drawer would not remain secret for long. Jackson says that secret compartments disappeared with the highly skilled craftsman at the turn of the century. A glass table top over a stainless-steel frame can hide few secrets. While in the 19th century, mystery was cultivated as a style and dark wood panels might easily hide a compartment, in this century, clarity in design has, until recently, been the rule. In this century, everything from bank accounts and safe-deposit vaults to the modernist esthetic of minimalism has militated against secret places in the home. ''Unfortunately, I didn't know my client was going to put an electric typewriter on it: the typewriter acti vated the glass.'' One desk in the New York furniture maker's current Deadly Weapons series is called the B-1, after the bomber: Like the airplane, whose wings shift in flight, the desk has parts that slide open and unfold, including a secret compartment.įrom Egyptian pyramids to Lucrezia Borgia's poison ring, great cunning has always been exercised in making secret rooms and compartments. ''There was another desk in which the glass slid away when you passed your hand over a certain part,'' Mr. In one custom-made etag ere, for example, a secret drawer would glide open when a book with a sensor was placed on a specific shelf. Jackson built furniture with secret compartments that could be opened by arcane movements known only to the person for whom it was designed. When, in the late 1960's, he decided to apply his skills to making more comfortable and conventional pieces on a commercial basis, the former magician succeeded in transferring an element of magic while eliminating the discomfort. AS a magician in a family of magicians, Dakota Jackson learned from an early age to make the type of stage furniture in which a blonde might be sawed in two.
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