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Object Culture

Las Vegas carpets offensively designed to keep your eyes off the floor?

By Rain Noe - September 2, 2010

These days there are high-end hotels in Las Vegas that will sell you new versions of the luxurious sheets, pillows, and even toiletries that they stock their rooms with. But the casinos on their ground floors are a different story; no one wants to furnish their house with the gaudy trappings surrounding a roulette table.

Las Vegas Carpets was an exhibit by photographer Chris Maluszynski, no longer on display but captured in a Wired gallery here. Looking through them you wonder, why are all these patterns so awful? The article provides a possible answer:

Dave Schwartz, Director of the Center for Gaming Research at the University of Nevada Las Vegas...theorizes that "casino carpet is known as an exercise in deliberate bad taste that somehow encourages people to gamble."

via wired

Object Culture

Rain Noe

Rain Noe is a writer and industrial designer based in New York City.

6 Comments

Peter

8 years ago

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It also has the benefit of disguising dropped poker chips, so they can be picked up be keen-eyed casino staff. The nightclub bussy within me knows these things.
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BlaineOh

8 years ago

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The carpets are ugly for the same reasons there are no clocks or windows, casino staff are instructed never to say "good morning" to a guest, and there is indoor smoking.

You are not reminded to leave nor wanted to even see an exit.

They want you to stay and, ahem, "game".
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kbulo

8 years ago

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Here's a gallery of more rugs from Vegas casinos -- pop quiz style. http://bit.ly/cxa1IR
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Benxamin

8 years ago

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It was my understanding that the carpet is non-aesthetic, but that it was made to disorient you. Thanks for the tip TDP!
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TDP

8 years ago

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Maybe Dave Schwartz should not be talking about something that he really doesn't know. Maybe they should have talked to the Director of Interior Design or Architectural Design at UNLV before him; the people who actually design these floors. I could throw my expertise in... I'm an architectural designer for one of the major casino design firms in Vegas; also previously worked at two other Casino design firms. The carpet design is to make the walking person that is looking downwards nauseated until that person looks up from the ground or forward to see all the slot machines and casino games hoping that they see or hear the excitement from other gamblers hoping they will gamble too.
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john

8 years ago

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I always thought it was to help hide any stains or spills. But that makes just as much sense.
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