The tyranny of taste: the politics of architecture and design in Britain, 1550-1960

Abstract

Introduction PART 1 - THE CONSUMER SOCIETY: London - The First Modem City Portrait of an Economy A New Economic Theory. PART 11 - THE STABLE SOCIETY: Preface The Control of London's Expansion Seating the Gentry: Competing Motives - Competitive Consumption or Noblesse Oblige?, A Common Task: What was the Function of Gentry Residence?, Both Ruler and Ruled Projects and Manufactures: Nifles, Trifles, Design Manufactures. PART III - THE LUXURY DEBATE: Preface: History and Ideas The Luxury Debate, 1559 - 1660 Competitive Consumption: Barbon: The Infinitive Wants of the Mind, Mandeville The Spectator David Hume Adam Smith: Beauty and Economic Growth, Improvements in Production, The Progress of Opulence. PART IV - STYLE AND ECONOMICS - 17th & 18th CENTURIES: Preface The Early Stuarts: Penshurst and the Old Fashion of England, The Meaning of Classicism, Arbiter Elegantiarum The Spectator and Pope Hogarth's Analysis of Beauty. PART V - DESIGNER REFORM: Preface The Encouragement of the Arts of Design in the Eighteenth Century The Condition of England Pugin The Schools of Design and the Great Exhibition The Opponents of Design Reform Ruskin. PART VI - MODERN MOVEMENT AND WELFARE STATE: Preface Design, Interiors and Personal Consumption: The Modem Style: Loos and Le Corbusier, British Design Debates in the '30s and '40s Architecture: The Interior, The Struggle for Light, Free Love and Free Planning Town Planning: Modernist Painting, Depressed Areas and Land Use Planning, Town Planning 1906-1947, Framing the 1947 Act Modernist Ideas into Action: Daylighting and Density Control, Architect Planners. PART VII - CONCLUSION: PLATO'S CONUNDRUM.