The space of the glazed window in nineteenth-century London

Abstract

ABSTRACT During the nineteenth century, the widespread adoption of clear-glass windows facilitated the development of a new space of urban experience. The area immediately adjacent to the inside or outside of the glass window became an important venue in which the daily life of the city unfolded. Before the advent of industrially produced glass, urban shops and dwellings were either open or closed to the outside. The integration of glazed windows into the structures of nineteenth-century cities, however, created a new hybrid space of urban experience, allowing persons to be part of the outside life of the city, whilst simultaneously remaining physically separated from it.