Gender Modernism Interior Design

This book is centred upon the lifestyle and design outcomes of some early twentieth century designers, Elsie de Wolfe, Eileen Gray and Syrie Maugham. They worked in America, France and England in a critical period for the formation of what was termed modernism. The primary concern of this book is to examine the relationship between the orthodox discourse of modernism and what such designers actually accomplished especially in relation to issues of gender and their subversion of accepted roles. The illusion of autonomy and abstraction is examined as representing a conflict with economic, sexual, social and psychological meaning in the creation of interior space place and identity. A discursive analysis of issues involving three areas of critical theory is used, namely Gender Studies, including Feminist Theory, Interior-Design History and the Historiography of Modernist Ideology. Texts from a wide range of disciplines are revised and combined with theoretical knowledge in order to critically re-evaluate the lives and works of the three women designers and others. Archival evidence and media reviews are presented in order to compare previously published narratives and form a review of gender, modernism and interior design history.