Reassembling the social interior: historical spaces from contemporary viewpoints, reveals the richly layered works of artists, designers, craftspeople, landscape gardeners and architects, and their contributions to the construction of interiors, and interrelated exteriors, of the past. Surveying a range of historical periods, the book explores collective meanings embedded within the furnishings and fittings of houses and homes, public and private buildings. The book considers how these spaces have powerful significance for contemporary audiences, particularly in ways that are relatable to shared experiences of work, leisure, family, community, power and politics. In Reassembling the social interior, the authors describe the communicative and interpretative qualities of works that connect with the present-day, by reflecting on, remaking and re-imagining, places, spaces and objects that once populated people’s lives. Palatial to austere, Reassembling the social interior foregrounds human relationships in the plan, design and creation of homes, interiors and sites of the past. The book is concerned with recent research on the history of the domestic interior that has highlighted the significance of meanings embedded in the landscape, architecture, decoration and objects that comprise the furnishings and fittings of houses and homes. Despite the expansive reach of this field of research, encompassing grand, architectural schemes and minute inventoried, personal, belongings, the book argues that often the interpretative and communicative aspects of art and design that make up the social meanings of these spaces is misrepresented or can be overly speculative. Therefore, in Reassembling the social interior: historical spaces from contemporary viewpoints, the contributions of artists, designers and craftspeople might best be foregrounded in constructing ideas of authenticity, transparency, and materiality in the making process, alongside scholarly study.
