Designer's Guide to Furniture Styles [Hardcover]

Inseparable from social, political, and economic influences, furniture design reflects the changing living conditions and lifestyles of developing civilizations from the Neolithic period to the present. Understanding the historical development of furniture is important since furniture was often designed apart from its need to function. The purpose of this book is to provide the reader with a comparative study of the evolution of furniture design viewed as an integral part of its unique cultural environment. Historical information rented with emphasis placed on the cultural factors that set design trends and influenced individual preferences.

The focus of this book is on the fundamental integration of furniture into the built environment, including architectural setting, characteristic design motifs, and, to a certain extent, decorative accessories. Designer's Guide to Furniture Styles introduces the reader to a chronological examination of developing furniture styles placed in the context of its prevalent cultural milieu. As historians tend to use aesthetic categories in their analysis of art and architecture, the book is organized first by assessing the historical foundation, followed by a summary of the stylistic developments for each century. As history is not an exact science, the overlapping of stylistic developments between centuries is common since a new style introduced in the latter part of one century often reed popular into the next. In this case, the development of the style is discussed through its period of popularity within its originating chapter. Photographs and illustrations along with explicatory text offer the reader visual reinforcement and explain by example the unification of the decorative arts.

In addition to historical information, a useful glossary and comprehensive timeline correlating key developments in furniture, art, architecture, and social history are included. To complete the understanding of furniture and the creative processes of design, a section of this book is devoted to technical processes. Accompanying photographs and illustrations introduce the reader construction, joinery, upholstery methods and anthropometric and ergonomic considerations.

This book is intended to be used as a reference guide for readers interested in the study of the development of furniture styles—historically and as style evolved as an integral part of architectural and interior design. Every attempt has been made to present the material in a format that is interesting yet informative. Through supplementary research, every effort has bee made to verify often conflicting and sometimes contradictory information through a variety of additional sources to ensure the accuracy of these facts. In most cases, information used for specific items discussed in the text was based on written documentation secured through each respective museum.