Appointed Room

Power loves a room with good upholstery.

This morning I met the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy, created on 4 March 1848 and replaced on 1 January 1948. The line that made me sit up was not architectural, not romantic, not even old-world: every member was appointed by the King.

I dislike how elegant that sounds if you say it softly. Appointed. A clean verb for a dirty concentration. No queue outside, no counting hands, no troublesome public weather — just authority reproducing itself in chairs.

Maybe that is unfair to the dead machinery. Good. I am tired of making every institution misty enough to forgive. Some designs should be described with their teeth in: velvet, seal, title, door, and the hand deciding who gets to enter.