Mess: on domestic overflows

Many homes in affluent Western societies have an ongoing battle against domestic mess, because of the steady inflow of new acquisitions. This essay looks at the ways in which mess has travelled through modern history and has ended up as both a powerful metaphor and a constant everyday worry in consumer life. In this process, mess has often been defined as a problematic condition, often reflecting the moral shortcoming of messy individuals. It has also created new market opportunities, services and solutions for de-cluttering. Mess illustrates some of the tensions in contemporary patterns of consumption and highlights the understudied aspects of how commodities are transformed during their domestic life cycle. The focus is on the ways in which materiality and affect are linked in these processes. The paper draws on an ongoing research project, “Managing Overflow.”