Sample Assignment Questions for Furnishings and Interiors 1850 to the Present Day Use the assignment to further some area of personal interest. For example, there may be a particular period or style that interests you, or you may want to analyse furnishings and interiors in historic photographs in your possession, or even the way in which you have furnished your own home. E.g. To what extent does inheritance determine how we furnish and inhabit our homes; to what extent are we really innovative? There are other themes such as the place of ideology, gender, nature or technology in furnishings and interiors which could be explored. Or some of the questions laid out below: Can AWN Pugin really be claimed to be the ancestor of 20th century Modernism? The spirit of the Arts and Crafts Movement was highly significant and entirely beneficial to subsequent design movements. Is this a true statement? Was Art Nouveau a stylistic cul-de-sac, or a stepping stone to Modernism? Were the ideas of International Modernism entirely innovatory, or the culmination of earlier developments? Was Art Deco simply boudoir furnishing, or did it represent a serious furnishing style? Organic Modernism was based on uniquely American concepts of furniture design. Discuss this statement. To what extent were stylistic innovations in the 1960’s, and in particular Pop Culture, truly led by the mass consumer as opposed to the designer? How truly ‘post’ modern is Post Modernism? What effects have changes in architectural design and domestic arrangements had on furniture design from 1850 to the present day? Given contemporary trends in furniture styling, social manners and domestic arrangements, how do you see furnishings and interiors developing in the next decade?