I'm reading a fantastic book at the moment Virginia Postrels "The Substance of Style" even though it was published some time ago, I only came across it a few months ago while I was listen to my favourite Podcast by Debbie Millman. So I went off to borders and ordered it finally arrived and now I'm fully engrossed within its insightful observations about our aesthetic developments as an ever-increasing visually sensitive society. I guess its only natural that as we are bombarded by information and advertisements from everywhere and anywhere that we are driven to beautiful things that are well designed. Anyway in her book she speaks about the humble toilet brush. An implement whose function hasn't changed much since it was invented yet the diversity of shapes and colours is quite amazing; anyway I wont try to explain it here is a quote from her book (pg57):

" The toilet brush is an unusually pure example of aesthetic demands. Who can seriously ascribe the desire for a pleasing brush caddy to the status-craving drive to impress the neighbours? Stainless-steel appliances, beautifully tailored clothes, or cool cars may (or may not) mask such other -directed motivations. But a brush hidden in the corner of the bathroom, a bathroom your neighbour will quite likely never see, is surely just a brush, an object acquired for its own sake. And what sort of prestige could possibly accrue to a tool for cleaning toilets, however lovely or expensive its case might be? The look and feel of your toilet brush are just that - sensory pleasures, expressions of what you find appealing.

How, then, do people come to believe that their lives would be a little better, their surroundings a bit more enjoyable, if they could store their cleaning tools in an attractive or expressive case? Toilet brushes are, after all, rarely advertised. They have to speak for themselves, with no talking frogs or pop tunes to promote them. Toilet brushes are usually minor purchases made without deep analysis, and each brush cleans pretty much as well as the next. So the immediate sensory appeal of the brush set on the shelf is decisive. We buy aesthetic models because we like what we see and feel. Exposure, not manipulation, creates demand."

And here is a collection that I put together (I collected these as part of the lecture that I was teaching this week...just in case you think that I am developing an unhealthy obsession with toilet brushes!)