What are the main features of the following design movements and styles?

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aesthetically 
aluminum 
apogee 
cardboard 
chrome 
conspicuously 
copper 
elaboration 
enhance 
entice 
judicious
implication
interior
irrelevant
one-of-a-kind 
ornament
pavilion
posit
plywood
prominence
seamless
splint
steel
teaching
turmoil
typify
uniquely
utility
utopian
wane 
4. Read the text. 
The second quarter of the twentieth century saw radical changes in design. 
The Art Deco style, which reached its apogee at the 1925 Exposition des Arts 
Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris, gradually waned; its decorative 
flourishes and emphasis on rich and exotic materials seemed increasingly irrele-
vant, considering the economic pressures of the Great Depression in the United 
States and growing political instability in Europe. It was replaced by young 
modernist reformers who believed that beauty need not depend on ornament but 
could be achieved through the manipulation of form and the judicious use of 
color and texture, that simplicity and economy were preferable aesthetically –
even morally and politically – to the elaboration and extravagance that typified 
Art Deco. The geometric forms and plain undecorated surfaces favored by mod-
ernists were, however, too demanding for most people. It was with relief that 
consumers turned to the warmer organic design, with its emphasis on wood and 
natural materials, that emerged in Scandinavia in the mid-1930s. 
The Bauhaus, founded in Weimar in 1919 as a school of arts and crafts, 
soon became known as a center of avant-garde design under the direction of 
Walter Gropius. The school strove to mold designers who could create beauti-
ful and useful prototypes suitable for commercial production. In 1933, the Na-
zis closed down the Bauhaus, but during its brief existence it produced a gen-
eration of architects, artists, and designers who spread its teachings around the 
world. Among these were the architects Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, 
and Marcel Breuer; the designers László Moholy-Nagy, Marianne Brandt, and 
Wilhelm Wagenfeld; and the painters Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Oskar 
Schlemmer, and Josef Albers.
One of the strongest and most influential reactions against the Art Deco 
movement came from the Swiss architect Le Corbusier. His Pavilion de 
l’Esprit Nouveau at the 1925 Exposition was a forceful rejection of the use of 
expensive, exotic materials in the extravagant, one-of-a-kind objects that typi-
fied Art Deco. He defined the house as a “machine for living in,” while furni-

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ture was “domestic equipment.” The pavilion itself was a prototype for stan-
dardized housing, conspicuously furnished with commonly available items 
such as leather club chairs. Like members of the Bauhaus, Le Corbusier advo-
cated furniture that was rationally designed along industrial principles to re-
flect function and utility in its purist forms, with a strict rejection of applied 
ornament. Other important movements positing avant-garde theories of design 
and architecture included De Stijl in Holland, which advocated a seamless 
unity of art and architecture, and Russian Constructivism, whose utopian pro-
jects embraced a combination of machine forms and abstract art.
In the United States, designers responded to European influences, gradu-
ally transforming them into a uniquely American idiom. Many of the most 
prominent figures in the pre-war period were, in fact, European émigrés. The 
American Designers' Gallery in New York opened in 1928 and introduced 
consumers to modern interiors and furnishings by designers including Ilonka 
Karasz, Joseph Urban, and Donald Deskey. Many of its designers used indus-
trial materials such as steel and chrome in their furniture. The machine aes-
thetic was an important influence on design. The Streamlined style, with its 
aerodynamic forms and implications of speed, reinforced the growing impor-
tance of automobiles and trains. The role of the industrial designer itself 
gained prominence, especially during the Great Depression, when companies 
relied on designers such as Henry Dreyfuss and Raymond Loewy to create en-
ticing new product designs in an effort to stimulate consumer demand.
World War II profoundly affected the material and formal developments of 
architecture and design. Items such as steel, aluminum, and copper were rationed 
for use in the war effort, forcing designers to substitute nonessential materials, 
including cardboard, glass, and plywood, in their designs. Many American de-
signers worked for the war effort itself, applying their knowledge and expertise 
to military exigencies. Charles and Ray Eames, for example, worked on behalf 
of the U.S. Navy, developing molded plywood designs for leg splints. 
Much of this new technology found its way into furniture design following 
the war. Charles and Ray Eames developed their highly influential LCW chair, 
an inexpensive, mass-produced molded plywood object, from their wartime 
experiments. Museums and designers across the country turned their energies 
to promoting American design through the Good Design movement, which 
promised quality-of-life enhancing products for any budget. Inspired in part by 
pre-war European efforts to democratize design through industrial production, 
this movement energetically promoted modern design to the American con-
sumer through museum exhibitions, trade shows, and advertising. Likewise, 
European design councils sponsored exhibitions and designers in an effort to 
stimulate national consumer interest. Following years of economic and politi-

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cal turmoil, consumers now had access to goods of modern design in rapidly 
increasing quantities. 

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