Interior Design History:

Twentieth-Century
Number One:
Victorianism & Arts and Crafts
The Industrial Revolution
generated a totally new
social structure in America
and Europe. The forces of
industrialization and
urbanization dictated a new
way of life for the
population as a whole. This
lithograph by Currier & Ives
depicts four of the major
inventions of the nineteenth
century: the lightning steam
press, the electric
telegraph, the locomotive,
and the steamboat, all of
which were developed
during the Industrial
Revolution.
By the mid-
nineteenth century,
Britain led the world
in terms of trade and
enjoyed great
prosperity. The
foundation of a
capitalist economy
spawned a thriving
middle class
anxious to express
its new found
prosperity in terms
of visual culture.
Items of household
decoration such as
wallpaper, textiles,
and carpets were now
being massed
produced and
purchased for the first
time by a bourgeoisie
who emulated their
social superiors with
the furnishings of a
formal drawing room.
The Great Exhibition of the Industry of All
Nations, better known as the Crystal Palace
Exhibition of 1851, was devised and
organized by Queen Victoria's German
husband Prince Albert to publicize Great
Britain's military, industrial and economic

superiority at that time.

The formal drawing room was used to receive visitors, and usually had heavy curtains and thick lace at the
windows, a patterned carpet, generously upholstered seating, and a huge range of ornaments pictures and
surface decoration. This New York City drawing room of 1870 was designed for a man named A. T Stewart
and is considered high Victorian. As historians noted in 1903, The location, the character of the design, the
choice of the material, everything about the house, inside and out, showed that the old Irish merchant wanted
to make a grand impression; and he undoubtedly succeeded in doing so upon his contemporaries."
Bedroom, A. T. Stewart residence, 1870
Entrance Hall, A. T. Stewart residence, 1870
Furniture could be bought from the new department stores or in America by mail order,
Furniture companies used rich fabrics with added details like buttoning, tufting, pleating,
and fringing to create sumptuous effect. The chairs used internal springing, popularized in
France to provide a visual, rather than merely physical effect of comfort. The springs
returned the seat to the desired smooth shape after use.

Writer, designer, and artist
A. W. N. Pugin (1812-1852)
However all pervasive the
Victorian middle class desire
to express comfort and
wealth, the aesthetic
standard of the interior
disturbed contemporary
critics, and a large body of
writing appeared during the
nineteenth century to give
advice on taste and interior
design. Writers such as A. W.
N. Pugin (1812-1852)
onwards equated what they
regarded as good
designwith high moral
standards
Pugin led a campaign
for the Gothic style. For
him, Gothic was an
expression of a just
and Christian society in
contrast to nineteenth-
century industrial
society and its social
ills.

The epitome of Gothic

architecture: Chartres Cathedral,
France, 1194.
The Victorian Gothic
revival was mainly
inspired by Pugin
and his interiors for
the new House of
Parliament building
(1840 -1852)
designed by Sir
Charles Barry. The
style continued in
use into the
twentieth century,
feeding the Arts and
Crafts movement.
Cardiff Castle in Wales, designed by William Burges and completed in
1881 is another fine example of Victorian Gothic architecture.
The summer and winter smoking rooms at Cardiff Castle
Tom Jones at Cardiff
Castle
 Pugins work was also an
inspiration to the leading writer
on art and design in Britain, John
Ruskin, who influenced taste in
interior design through his
writings on art in The Times
newspaper and his books, such
as The Seven Lamps of
Architecture and The Stones of
Venice. Like Pugin, he saw the
ugliness which surrounded him
as the unavoidable result of the
A Gothic misery brought on by the
arch Industrial Revolution and took
watercolor issue with the ostentatious
by Ruskin symbolism of wealth
characterized by Victorian
fashion.
Ruskin rejected mass-produced furniture
and furnishings he advocated the
design of the past. Like Pugin, good
taste and good morals were inseparable
for Ruskin.
Among the writers, artists, and
designers influenced by Ruskin
was the socialist, designer, and
founder of the Arts and Crafts
Movement, William Morris. Like
Ruskin, Morris detested the mass
produced household goods of the
day. He believed the production of
furniture and furnishings was a
valid enterprise for the architect and
the fine artist. In later years he
declared the Arts and Crafts
Movement should, Turn our artists
into craftsmen and our craftsmen
into artists! Although an avowed
Marxist, William Morris was a savvy
entrepreneur. In 1861 he founded
the design firm that eventually
became simply Morris & Co. Morris
& Co. continued to be successful as
a noted brand of for years after its
namesakes death in 1896.
Morriss ideas and inspiration for marketing interior design and the
production of furniture and furnishings were born out of the design,
building, and decoration of his house, the Red House at Bexley-Heath,
Kent, in 1859-1860. The house was designed by Morriss friend Phillip
Webb and hand decorated by not only Morris, but his artist friends such
as Edward Burne-Jones and the Pre-Raphaelite Dante Gabriel Rosetti.
Two Red House interiors
Drawings by
Edward Burne-Jones, c.1865
 Dante Gabriel Rosetti,
Beata Beatrix (1863) and The
Daydream (1880)
It was through the
influence of Ruskin and
Morris that furnishing an
interior with newly
acquired antiques
became fashionable for
the first time. The Sussex
Chair attributed to
Rossetti and produced by
Morris & Co. was a
recreation pf an earlier
vernacular model.
Morris & Co. dining room
Two examples of
Morris & Co. fabric
and fabric covered
Arts and Crafts
styled chairs
Morris & Co. tapestry and
wallpaper samples
Frontispiece for William
Morriss Kelmscott Press
edition of the writings of
John Ruskin, c.1891.
Greene and Greene put an American spin on British Arts and Crafts with the
Gamble House (1908) of Pasadena, CA with the inclusion of verandas and
courtyards.
Greene and Greene, dining room, Gamble House, 1908
 Greene and Greene, first floor Interior,
Gamble House, 1908

Greene and Greene, first floor Interior, Gamble House, 1908

Greene and Greene, Interior stairs, Gamble House, 1908
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Greene and Greene, Gamble House, 1908, Pasadena, CA

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