A History of Interior Design

Now in its third edition and fully updated with the most recent examples, A History of Interior Design tells the story of 6,000 years of domestic and public space. John Pile acknowledges that interior design is a field with unclear boundaries, in which construction, architecture, furniture, decoration, technology and product design all overlap. These topics are woven together in a fascinating narrative that runs from cave dwellings and temple architecture, through Gothic cathedrals and Renaissance palaces, to the grand civic spaces of the nineteenth century and the sleek interiors of modern skyscrapers. Embedded in a social and political context, detailed discussions of famous buildings, from the Parthenon to the Pompidou Centre, are interspersed with investigations of the domestic vernacular – the cottages, farmhouses, apartments and city terraces inhabited by ordinary people. In this new edition, the evolution of interior design has been made even more accessible through the inclusion of a CD-ROM with an interactive timeline. Incorporating over 100 illustrations, this sets the great interior spaces of the world in the context of the social, political and technological developments of the time.