The Architecture of Design: The Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Museum of Design (1896-1976)

Abstract

Challenging the dominant views of architecture as either a fine art, an 18th century affiliation with assumptions of disciplinary autonomy and the primacy of aesthetic experience, or design, a late 20th century notion emphasizing performance and problem solving, this dissertation examines a third transitional architectural orientation—architecture’s 19th century affiliation with the decorative arts and its relationship to the evolving notion of design throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. This orientation was one that emphasized architecture’s accessibility, openness to non-specialist participation, and situatedness in larger spheres of culture and experience. I explore this trajectory through the specific case of the Cooper Union Museum of the Arts of Decoration, (f. 1897), and its successor, the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Museum of Design (f. 1967), concluding with its Hans Hollein-designed inaugural exhibition, ManTRANSforms: Aspects of Design (1976). Examining three distinct periods in which the institution collected architecture within its evolving orientation to the decorative arts and design through its exhibitions, collections, and pedagogical engagement with the Cooper Union, this dissertation explores three primary questions: How did the institution and its activities contribute to the development of the concepts of ‘the decorative arts’ and ‘design’ in the 20th century? Secondly, how was architecture implicated materially and conceptually in these larger categories, and how did they shape the discipline as a result? Finally, how were its changing utilization and interpretation of historical objects in the collections reflective and even constitutive of these intellectual orientations? Combining methods from institutional history and the history of ideas, I identify three distinct conceptions of design that bridged architecture with other forms of creative endeavor: first, a 19th century notion of design that distinguished form and surface to emphasize the autonomy of two-dimensional composition; secondly, a mid-century approach that eschewed historical classifications to focus on individual characteristics through ahistorical visual and formal categories; and thirdly, a concept developed in the 1970s that expanded the definition of design to new scales and forms, broadening the scope to include the quotidian and anonymous efforts of the layperson.