Unraveling the Textile in Modern Architecture: Guest Editor's Introduction

Abstract

Gathered in this special issue of Studies in the Decorative Arts are four articles that deal in different ways with the same thesis: that textiles and theories of textile design have a vital place in modern architecture and design. Ranging from the literal incorporation of textiles—curtains, pillowcases, blankets, rugs—into architectural ensembles to more abstract conceptions of textiles as wrappers or disguises of structure, the concept of the textile is interwoven into modern buildings. Whether architects were studying folk embroideries as emblems of cultural authenticity, divining new ways of defining space, or finding a means to soften the hard edges of modern technology, the realm of the so-called “soft arts” proved critical to their enterprise. In these essays we are less interested in the design of textiles as objects for modern interiors, a subject that has begun to receive muchneeded attention in the literature on decorative arts. Instead we are more interested in the way textile production was theorized to affect the production of ornament and space in architecture. Despite differences in time, geography, and philosophical outlook, there is a strand that connects the structural and ornamental innovations of the buildings explored in these pages. That strand is the theory of architecture and its cladding, both interior and exterior, postulated in the nineteenth century by Gottfried Semper. With new and first translations of key Semper texts into English made available by Harry Mallgrave in the past two decades, the study of Semper and his influence has become more widespread. Most important here is Semper’s Bekleidungsprinzip, or “principle of dress,” his conception of architectural dressing based on a careful consideration of the relationship of materials, tectonics, and ornament and the partnership of technology and cultural practice in the development of architectural form. Within these essays, we adhere to the understanding of the Bekleidungsprinzip that specifically associates the act of cladding a building with the more opaque concept of its dressing, “cloaking” its structure beneath.1 Indeed, this is a crucial point: throughout the modern period, textiles have been a constant