them. To that end they developed a technical and aesthetic programme,
manifested in the years between the two world wars, known then as the
Modern Movement (now more commonly referred to as architectural
and design Modernism). While acknowledging the important contri -
bution made by that movement to the development of the modern interior
this study surveys its subject through a wider lens, setting it in the context
of a broader range of ideas emanating from the interior’s engagement
with modernity.
One of the key transformations brought about by the advent of
modernity’s main driver – industrialization – related to people’s private
and public experiences that affected the formation of both their self- and
their collective identities. This study of the modern interior was partly
triggered by an encounter with a scene from everyday life which raised a
number of questions for me about the relationship of private interiors
with the inside spaces of public buildings. Walking through a vast shop-
ping mall in Calgary in Alberta a couple of years ago I encountered a
small oasis of calm located in the midst of the hustle and bustle of mass
shopping. The scene, which comprised a set of comfortable armchairs
carefully positioned on an Oriental-style carpet and accompanied by
potted plants, resembled a domestic living room – one, however, that had
been removed from its more familiar private environment and reposi-
tioned in a public space that was utterly alien to it. Surrounded by enor-
mous plate glass windows, fast-moving escalators and huge structural
columns, that miniature scene seemed strangely out of place. What was
that private stage set doing in an otherwise public environment? Like the
Victorian parlour on which it modelled itself, it offered comfort and
refuge, however temporary, from the world of work and commerce – a
chance, that is, for a snatched moment of self-reflection and repose for its
occupants, and for them to see themselves as individuals in an environ-
ment otherwise dedicated to the anonymity of the crowd.
Surprisingly, in spite of its location within a larger interior space
with which it had no obvious relationship, that little setting had
retained its historical relevance and meaning. Also, although seeming
on the face of it so different, the two ‘interiors’ I had encountered – a
private domestic parlour and a public shopping mall – had, I realised on
reflection, something in common. While, back in the nineteenth century,
the former had served as a sanctuary for middle-class Victorian men who
had left home on a daily basis to work in factories and offices, the latter,
a slightly later development, had developed as a covered space in which 9006_018_Modern_Intro:Layout 1 30/5/08 15:31 Page 9