The 28th of April 2025 marked an incredibly important date in the history of design and architecture. This was the 100th anniversary of the famous Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes held in Paris in 1925. Over 16 million people were said to have visited during its run to witness a huge showcase of the decorative and industrial arts. It was felt that the turmoil and destruction of World War I had destabilised France’s position as a leading light for culture and this was an attempt at announcing their return in a grand and bold way.
Around 15,000 exhibitors from 20 countries gathered in the French capital with a detailed brief that explicitly stated that it was ‘open to all manufacturers whose products are artistic in character and show clearly modern tendencies’. There was an accepted wisdom that everything showcased had to be forward-thinking and new, with no revivalism of historical styles permitted.
Art Deco Comes to Life
A revolution of style had begun across Europe. Following the exhibition, many commentators would use the term Arts Decoratif for the movement, but it was not until the British magazine Architectural Review referred to it as Art Deco that it found an enduring name. Most of its proponents were too busy helping the style gather pace and reach further into every aspect of culture to worry about what history would eventually name it. Nevertheless, it is now clear that Art Deco was officially born in Paris in the spring of 1925.
Working From The Inside Out
Glimpses and pieces of what we now understand as Art Deco had been evident before this, of course. The timeless luxury of Parisian interiors had always been concerned with a progressive style that celebrated ornate fixtures in a modern way. Influences from the geometric motifs favoured by Cubism and the archaeology of Egypt and Mesoamerica, that was enchanting Europe’s elite, were definitely informing new design innovations, but they had yet to coalesce into a whole identity.
The 1925 exposition in Paris was the perfect catalyst for architects to see how the design language of these textiles, jewellery and objects created with striking sunbursts, ziggurats and chevrons could perhaps be transferred onto the built environment of cities. They envisioned how the shapes and styles of these vanity mirrors and necklaces would work for the façades of buildings and how together, they could even form an arresting skyline that was dominated by them.
Striking a Superb Balance
At the time of the exposition, there were two design forces competing to be seen and understood as the best way forward for the world. Initially, there was the celebration of new luxury that the craft ateliers in Paris were exploring, greatly inspired by the French furniture and interior designer Èmile-Jaques Ruhlman. His work gave a platform for rare materials, overt ornamentation and elegance with high craft and artisanal flair.
This style was rivalled by the more rational and strictly modernist applications of design that sought to rely on purpose and industry as the chief influence. The Swiss-French architect and theorist Le Corbusier had created his Pavillion of L’Esprit Nouveau for the exhibition that had polarised opinion amongst its visitors. This was a stark and austere showcase that rejected ornamentation for function, advocating for new applications of industry and mass production that would uncover modern beauty through clarity, proportion and purpose.
The Art Deco architecture movement grew between these two established roots of luxury and rationalism, drawing from them both to create something entirely new. It would become much more functional than the classic, history-facing designs that had held the world captive for centuries. However, it would also hold space for a more expressive glamour and style than pure modernism would allow. The tension between these two forces allowed two important things to happen. Firstly, it allowed for more life and imagination that would encourage the adoption of the general public and the interest of architects. Secondly, it made the prospect of working with new materials in an industrialised way extremely commercially viable.
Art Deco architecture was now set to sweep across the world, and it would undoubtedly make the biggest and most memorable waves across the Atlantic Ocean.
Decorating An Empire State
New York City came to be recognised as the epitome of Art Deco glamour. The images of titanic, elegant skyscrapers watching down on the ever-developing blueprint for a modern city below are so linked to this architectural movement that it is impossible to think of the place without them. And the Empire State Building on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan can easily be seen as the literal and figurative pinnacle of Art Deco Architecture.
Designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, this magnificent 102-storey building of steel, Indiana limestone, granite, aluminium and chrome stands 1454 feet tall above New York. It perfectly demonstrates the advances in Art Deco design that had streamlined the style with a precision celebrating repetition and clean geometry. The vertical ribbing and tiered setbacks create a monumental and iconic ziggurat silhouette that dominated the most famous skyline in the world for decades. It spoke to the history of great civilisations of the past with a temple-like structure in the clouds that displayed such confident ambition in a way no building had ever done before.
Even the construction process itself was an embodiment of the Art Deco movement’s obsession with progress. Those responsible had created the tallest building in the world in only 410 days between 1930 and 1931, treating its creation with a factory-like assembly line logic. Standardised panels and repeatable elements were made off-site and installed by specialised teams that did the same task for every floor. Over 4 stories of the steel frame were erected every week with the world looking on, and up, at an architectural marvel that would set the standard forever after. It was efficient, practical and functional with 3400 workers combining every single day to raise it to the sky.
The interiors were also home to an indescribable new form of luxury and glamour that Art Deco had worked hard to protect from Modernism. Polished marble walls with bronze and aluminium trim are everywhere and the lobby motif of radiating beams is straight from the movement’s playbook, displaying motion, grace and power with the electricity of modernity at its core.
A Fitting Tribute
Just six years on from the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes, the Art Deco architecture movement had its own monument in the most advanced city in the world. One so huge and impressive that it even shaped the sunlight that shone behind it, casting shadows and illuminating streams on the developing 21st century world below.
