Consumption of modern furniture as a strategy of distinction in Turkey

Abstract

This study scrutinizes consumption of modern design as a strategy of distinction in Turkey. Conceptualizing taste as an acquired and dynamic medium through which inhabitants build and sustain social relationships, the article examines domestic furnishings as tools for constructing a Western socio-cultural difference from the late nineteenth century through to the 1950s and 1960s. Furthermore, it looks at the structures acting on furniture design and consumer choices. The study explicates the view that architects and decorators promoted a taste reform towards different versions of European Modernism throughout the 1930s and in the mid-twentieth century. The modern emerged as a distinctive element, not just between different classes but also within upper-class consumers themselves. The luxurious hotel projects, particularly the pivotal Istanbul Hilton Hotel, were instrumental in spreading the codes of furniture and for shaping contemporary practices, when the influx of US culture had an all-pervading impact, in the post Second World War context. A shift in the dominant taste towards modern designs, the use of synthetic materials, such as Formica, and the advent of new design elements, such as the American bar, revealed a concern for taking part in a new modern identity that reflected cultural competence in the way the West was (re)interpreted. © The Author [2009]. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Design History Society. All rights reserved.