“What happens if you try to change the world and you’re successful?” asked William Keyes Rudolph, introducing a touring exhibition entitled Victorian Radicals*.
The answer, where interiors are concerned, illustrates the Law of Unintended Consequences. It arises from nothing more complicated than the geometry of walls.
A wall presents two dimensions to the room it encloses. Some of the most influential Victorian designers regarded as bogus any attempt to use wall-coverings to add the third dimension, depth. Their influence cut straight across the development of wall-coverings, which until then had been heading in the direction of biophilia, via simple scenes and Chinese landscapes. In came flat patterns, geometry and abstracts; out went panoramas.
It’s hard to overstate the influence Victorian designers had. Owen Jones produced The Grammar of Ornament in 1856 and it became the interior designers’ Bible. Flat repeating motifs, patterns and geometric figures are prominent in this beautiful book, which is still in print. Jones designed wallpapers for 30 years. Augustus Pugin, perhaps best known for Big Ben but another designer whose work included wallpapers, believed 3D effects were ‘dishonest’ and disturbing. From there to minimalism and monochrome is no great distance.
The Victorians could hardly have been expected to anticipate modern office buildings. But their influence persisted into the 20th century, and ideas of what was suitable at home were easily transposed to the workplace. Ironically, the Victorians’ reaction against the Industrial Revolution - perhaps exemplified best by the Arts & Crafts Movement - may have contributed a century later to Sick Building Syndrome.
The moral? When you try to change the world, don’t leave the natural world out of your calculations.
* Victorian Radicals: From the Pre-Raphaelites to the Arts & Crafts Movement is a collection from Birmingham Museums Trust. It is at San Antonia Museum of Art until 5 Jan 2020.
David Guest, journalist and author of "Towns of Two Halves"