I have been re-reading Penny Sparke’s As Long as it’s Pink: The Sexual Politics of Taste (1995). The title is a reference to Henry Ford’s statement regarding his mass produced car in ‘any colour the customer wants as long as it’s black’. The author describes modernist architecture as essentially a masculine ethos based on ideas around mechanisation, a stripping away of ornament and a denial of the symbolism and meaning inherent in much of the interior decorating that women had been doing in their homes up to that time. In the nineteenth century, design reformers had begun to advise on the proper decoration of the home as a responsibility with a moral purpose, and that it was a woman’s task to make thoughtful selections when it came to the use of ornament (eg. John Ruskin).
I’m not sure I had ever thought about this ‘problem’ before, and I wanted to have a look at female designers like Eileen Gray and Charlotte Perriand to see how their ideas differed from the male modernists of the time. Caroline Constant made the point that Gray associated herself with the leading modernist architects so that she could get her name out there (by being part of a bigger movement) but we all know that her interiors were decorative (glamorous even). She was part of that milieu of the Paris decorateurs in the early twentieth century; the leading ‘high’ art deco decorators being male in general, pointed out by Patricia Bayer in her book Art Deco Interiors. Gray considered purely reductive design, based entirely on scientific principles, as ‘ridiculous’ and believed design should express the spirit of the age in which it was created. Her designs offered a solution to a problem plus a layer of whimsy and magic. Perriand’s way of speaking about her work was in the same language as her colleague Le Corbusier, except that integral to her thinking were also intangible things like ‘atmosphere’, ‘ambiance’ and ‘harmony’ whilst also referring to the home as a ‘habitat’ designed in accordance with ‘material data’ but for the ‘sensitivity’ of the human body. Le Corbusier described her as an expert in domestic design (presumably because she was a woman – in the Bauhaus also female students were only allowed to study craft / domestic-related subjects).
Penny Sparke critiqued the modernist’s determination to aspire to a beauty that would evolve from purely functional designs, based on logical principles; an aspiration, as Perriand said, not to ‘prettify [furniture] unncessarily’. Sparke begins her book with a reference to a television programme she had watched in which the wife of an architect, who dictated how their home should look, used to stand in her child’s bedroom and cry occasionally, as it was the only room in their home in which there was a relaxation of her husband’s modernist principles. She craved flouncy curtains and some conspicuous decoration.
Ornament and decoration are necessary, VERY MUCH SO! Ornament enriches our lives, it always has since the first humans began making and decorating objects. It declares our innermost feelings, it allows our imaginations to expand. It is considered quite a feminine thing, perhaps, because all of these ideas are about feelings and warmth, creating social and historical connections, comfort, memory, perhaps nostalgia. Sparke is critical about the impact of modernism but I believe in its socially democratic ideals although they were certainly masculine in origin (however, there was an aim to allow women more leisure time by freeing themselves from the kitchen and laundry). I sympathise with the modernists’ criticism of bourgeois ornament being part of a set of ‘manners’ and social rules and restrictions. Decorations and nicknacks harboured dust at a time when architects and social reformers were working together to try to solve the problem of providing clean affordable housing during epidemics of tuberculosis, typhoid etc. Ornament came to be associated with old, unjust class structures whereas modernism was bright, clean (and easily cleaned), optimistic, easily replicated and more affordable. Sparke’s perspective is really interesting though with regard to the way in which the traditional tendency of women to display, maintain social rituals and beautify the domestic space was undermined by the modernist way of thinking. Or at least there was an attempt to curtail or impose discipline on it.
What transpired (in a way) is that alternative strands of modern design that were developing concurrently with modernism, that were inspired by organic forms from nature, didn’t win the the battle of the ‘styles’ (a modernist would kill me for calling it a ‘style’) and mechanistic modernist discourse and polemic became the leading approach to ‘good’ design. Once European modernists emigrated to the USA modernism became mixed up with industrial design and streamline moderne which came about as a symbolic reference to streamlined vehicles. It took on organic characteristics which were found in abundance in commercial architecture and in domestic interiors, it lent itself to stylistic flourishes (for the sake of it) and became whimsical and more feminine once more. Because it was a commercial style it was perceived to be less worthy than high modernism, but in that 1930s iteration I think it embodied, to a greater extent, those more feminine ideas of harmony and ‘atmosphere’ and it seemed that the mostly male architectural profession had to provide what the masses wanted, even if they didn’t agree with it.
When Sparke wrote her book there had already been revivals of art deco (’60s & ’70s), Edwardianism and Victoriana (’80s) but the ideas of ‘good design’ were still as the modernists had described them in the 1920s. Good design was about restriction, a paring back to the essentials, logic, precise geometry and a sobre approach to the design of the domestic interior. Trends were in the realm of fashion and commerce and were frowned upon by the likes of that poor woman’s husband – which I think encouraged Sparke to write her book. A really interesting central idea of the book is that design transmits different messages to women than it does to men. I have seen evidence, from the art deco era in Ireland, of male architects designing leisure venues in the feminine moderne style, and recognising that they were acquiescing to the taste of the masses.
I think that this was in fact a feminine taste, and this book has helped me to tease out the idea. Modernism, Sparke suggested, was generally concerned with the urban context which at the time was a masculine environment (the place of professionalism and industry). Perhaps the design of new leisure buildings and infrastructure in the 1930s was where women were more obviously considered as part of the equation; when we look at venues like cinemas but also liminal spaces along seafronts, like lidos and buffets – this is where a softening of the masculine values of modernism had to take place. While the domestic sphere was where a battle was being fought against germs, leisure places had practically unavoidable associations with fashion – which was a feminine arena – and fashion was employed to entice the customer into these spaces. This effectively gave women more of a sense of agency (perhaps unconsciously) as their experience of modern design was being considered and formulated in those new leisure landscapes.
Books
Books referred to apart from As Long as it’s Pink are: Charlotte Perriand by Charlotte Perriand (English-French edition from 2018); Eileen Gray (2000) Caroline Constant; Art Deco Interiors (1998) Patricia Bayer; The Aesthetic Movement by L. Lambourne (1996).
nova: vintage treasure 