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Is Ikea Making a Rocky Horror Picture Show Furniture Set?

The Internet recently lit up like the string of Christmas lights festooning Will Byers’ living room thanks to the Swedish furniture-for-the-people store Ikea. Apparently, the living room sets of the iconic Stranger Things, The Simpsons, and Friends living rooms can be had in flat-pack-friendly interior design kits.

This marketing cross-pitch (interior design meets Gen X nostalgia) falls a little short of its own in-house creative in my opinion. Not that I’m not a fan of the aforementioned franchises but I recently spied this pendant lamp advert, which got me thinking:

Ikea

Where is Ikea’s Rocky Horror Picture Show collection? Is their sly “Science fiction, double function” reference (sing it in your head: “Science fiction, double feature, Dr. X will build a creature…”) an indication of what’s to come? Are they just testing the warm waters of sins of the flesh before rolling out, say, the Floor Show set? If so, I would make it “Mine, mine, mine, ma-ma-mine, mine, mine!” Then I can have a hex key/Allen wrench orgy as I assemble it in my living room. That would look like this:

Ikea wrench orgy.
My inner 12-year-old still marvels at the elegance of a sight gag pulled on me when someone handed me a Phillips head and asked: “Wanna screw?”

Until Ikea comes through with a laminated particle board version of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, the closest one can get to luxuriating amongst the film’s furnishings is to book a room at the castle that was used as its set. Now a luxury hotel re-christened Oakley Court, the spruced-up English manor retains its Victorian Gothic architecture throughout 118 rooms. And nine of those rooms were used for absolute pleasure during production. No assembly required.

By Daedalus Howell

I explore the creative life as a storyteller, artist, and entrepreneur. I’m the writer-director of Pill Head and the forthcoming feature film Wolf Story. I’m also the author, most recently, of the novel Quantum Deadline, and am active in media (Bohemian, Pacific Sun). Click to subscribe to my Substack!

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