Manrepeller Interior Design

Submission 19,427

About

Manrepeller Interior Design refers to a series of jokes to The Daily Mail's article "How to avoid turning your home into a manrepeller: Interiors therapist reveals the items that could be making your abode off-putting to men." The article features an interior designer explains what items found inside a female's apartment would upset or disinterest men, such as specific books and plants.

Origin

On February 10th, 2019, the English tabloid The Daily Mail^[1] published "How to avoid turning your home into a manrepeller." In the piece, the interior therapist instructs the author to remove books from the bedroom, books with "depressing titles," spiky plants like cacti, art by and featuring women and more (image below). She criticizes apartments with issues, "You’ll quite often find in the houses of very overweight people, the centre of the house is rammed with stuff."

Spread

Over the next week, people on Twitter ^[2] mocked the article and the interior design tips using the hashtag "#manrepeller." Twitter user @andiekarenina tweeted, "I mean, imagine a masculinity so fragile it was threatened by books. IMAGINE. #manrepeller" (shown below, left). Twitter^[3] user @RedrosieEP posted a photograph of several books on therapy and the caption, "Phew. Now I know where I’m going wrong @MailOnline #manrepeller #lifecoaching" (shown below, center). Twitter^[4] user @karen_hobbs tweeted a photograph of a plant in a bathroom and the caption, "Hi @MailOnline. I'm just a girl, pruning a palm, asking men to be repelled" (shown below, right).

Several media outlets covered the article and/or the reaction, The Daily Dot, ^[5] The Irish Times,^[6] The Guardian^[7] and more.