I don't actually find any of these all that terrible. I see as a rejection of the minimalist austerity that has been impressed upon us for so long. Some of these people are either creatives themselves or have clearly worked with a professional designer to accomplish this in a tasteful manner. This is nothing like what you'd find on the McMansion Hell or ZillowGoneWild corners of the internet. That Balmuda toaster though, that junk is just conspicuous consumption.
I have beefed on Kate Wagner since she was a sophomore in college, much of it on here. Zillow Gone Wild is a newer, paler, snarkier version of Lovely Listing, which came out right before the peak before the Great Recession, was bought by Cheezburger and driven into the ground. Kate Wagner's problem is she hates people who do what they want without consulting her favorite architects and interior designers, and wants to make sure that no one has inappropriate fun enjoying where they live. Lovely Listing was generally about "things you shouldn't put in your real estate listing" while Zillow Gone Wild is generally about "things other homeowners do that make you want to snark." There's a spiteful punching-down to both authors, an assumption that if you can't have nice things, no one can have nice things, a firm belief that decor is a thing that we are all required to practice lest we increase the moral turpitude of the nation. More importantly, though, neither author ever says anything constructive. They're all about pissing on what everyone else has done. "Mansion", on the other hand, is one of the most teeth-grindingly aspirational publications in architecture. There is no department at the WSJ quite so out-of-touch with middle America, quite so unabashedly fangirlish of excess, quite so thunderously self-entitled. Their newsletter won't even use the title; other bureaus just call them "WSJ Real Estate". And they aren't snarking. They never snark. They're here to tell you what is good, and to show you why it is good, and to show you why you should feel bad if you can't afford it. If this shit were in McMansion Hell, it would be because it infuriates Kate Wagner enough that she felt the need to make everyone else hate it, too. If it were in Zillow Gone Wild, it would be because it would theoretically prompt a group catharsis through shunning. It's not. It's in "Mansion" because the WSJ Real Estate bureau thinks you should do this to your house.
rich people have such bad taste - it's like some kind of social signaling to say "look at me, i have a thousand dollars to spend on an ugly concrete sink that will be out of style as soon as people recognize that it's already been out of style for 50 years"
Don Lemon spent several pages making this very point in The $12m Stuffed Shark - "rich people collect ugly, stupid shit because if you think it's ugly, it's a sign that their taste is more refined than yours." The twits in Pittsburgh with the sewing machine sink, tho? They ain't rich. But now the Rich get to be inspired by their bohemian bullshit.