STREA
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Things had little rea sleek all
1920′s America was the time of the Great Depression. Jobs were at an all-time low and stocks had lost 90% of their value. Customer demand was non-existent and the future of companies and businesses was looking bleak. Manufacturers needed new ways to increase consumerism and so formed an alliance with a new profession, known as the designer. Designers made everyday objects look like stylish and modern works of art.
People wanted modern appliances in their homes as they represented progress and gave them an optimistic view of the future. Style became equally as important as function and advertisers now had lots to talk about, promoting desirable lifestyles from new designs and giving the consumer the impression that by buying these products they were participating in economic progress. The great depression was still ongoing, but the economic innovations brought in by designers had made products affordable for everyone. By using stamping and moulding
The streamlining of transport in the 1920‘s made the shipping of materials to the USA more efficient and affordable, allowing American designers to use a range of materials that they usually have they hadwouldn’t the opportunity to use had access to. Aluminium, cheap but efficient materials, chromium, plywood and vinyl such as chrome, aluminium, wereand being used by designers vinyl plywood. Industrial products began to “receive a Machine Age makeover.” (Steven Heller & Louise Fili – Streamline.) Lamps, hairdryers and staplers were now characterised by curvaceous shapes that shouted speed and progress; everything was being designed with the future in mind. The Streamline movement inevitably had a huge influence on the American architecture of this time, giving birth to vast curvaceous buildings that presented little to no right angles.
ason to look of a sudden did. The access to colour printers gave graphic designers new ways to change their tired, ‘old fashioned’ looking advertisements, increasing visibility and giving product packaging a greater function by communicating through imagery and giving off an aura of excitement. Geometric patterns and shapes, borrowed from antiquity such as ‘ziggurats and lightning bolts’, were streamlined into icons. Consumers were embracing the modern day living and styling of their homes daily with products they may not have needed, but that served as an emotional pick up from the
Great Depression. By the late 1930s, Streamline design had become so popular that it had developed its own modernistic style in Graphic Design. Colour palettes were simple yet eye catching, using yellows, reds and oranges against grey tones. Typography took on sans serif letterforms over central axis, with poster designs having a ‘framed’ style. Streamlined Graphic Design then began to develop into futuristic mannerisms and became overused, losing its distinctive stamp on the marketing world. It was eventually made
redundant after the breakout of World War II in the early 1940s. Alluring graphics became unnecessary in the wartime economy and modernistic promotions ceased to be produced for the duration of the war. This book explores the characteristics of Streamline design at its best, the powerful effect that it had on America during the depression and how it still has an effect on modern design today.
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Raymond Lowey Industrial Designer 1893 - 1986
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Art Deco was an art movement that came about around 1915 just after World War 1, it spanned the roaring 1920s and the after years of the Great Depression up and till the later years of World War 2. The movement had evolved out of the end period of the Art Nouveau movement, which went on between the 1890 -1910. The Art Deco movement affected all forms of design throughout the time period, from fine art to interior architecture, from film to product design. France was the country of origin before it spread world wide as it flourished internationally in other countries such as America, England and
India. This art movement came about in a time of rapid urbanization and industrialization. Art Deco artists hoped to encompass this new surge of technology and create wonderful pieces that had lots of aesthetic pleasures to them. Amongst designers such as Lee Lawrie, Louis Lcart, Cassandre and other Art Deco artists a distinctive style was created that captured the use of bright colours, large bold geometric shapes/patterns and lavish ornamentation which adds pleasurable aesthetics. Compared to the organic nature of pieces from the Art Nouveau, this new style was completely different as it moved away from
organic curves and into using bold angles. This style of design tried to made items look extravagant, it gave them the fantasy feel; this gave people who brought into the Art Deco movement the feeling they were living the Hollywood lifestyle of glamour and luxury. However at the beginning of the 1930s a new design movement came about that ranged from the beginning of the great depression up until a few years after the war in the 1950s. This new design movement would come to be known as Streamline ‘Moderne’ which
evolved out of the Art Deco Movement. The new design movement has similarities to that of the Art Deco movement and it can be seen that Streamline Moderne designers have taken inspiration from those of the Art Deco. The similarities that both movements share range further than them both just sharing a similar time period, new technology pushed designers from both movements to experiment and produce new, modern pieces. Both movements also had impacts on a range of different arts such as film, photography, architecture and even transport design. But this is where the similarities end
Fig: Title
because the designers who preferred Streamline ‘Moderne’ movement wanted to strip back art deco and take off all the extravagant features of the objects created by these designers as they felt the features were just added for aesthetics and where not there for a purpose. American Industrial designers set up there own new movement because certain designers saw art deco as “effete and falsely modern art movement”. Where as Art Deco designers were inspired by angular shapes and geometric patters, Streamline ‘Moderne’ designers were inspired by curving forms, organic shapes and long horizontal lines.
Fig: Title
This was because the designers were interested in aerodynamics and giving items more speed, the main focus on the movement was making vehicles more streamlined so that they would go faster. This feeling of going fast was associated with the future and more modern times that would be ahead. The difference between how an Art Deco designer would design a clock and a Streamline ‘Moderne’ designer would design one can be seen by looking at photographs of the Art Deco clock on the left and the Streamline ‘Moderne’ clock on the right. The Art Deco designer has used large angular shapes placing them
next to one another to create a brightly colored clock with a geometric pattern on it, which is seen in the photo on the left. Where as the clock on the right shows long horizontal lines stretch round curved sides, this clock was designed by Streamline ‘Moderne’ designer as it looks more aerodynamic. During the Great American depression as people were out of work and had no money, companies needed their products to stand out compared to their competitors. This meant companies had to start working with designers, who started to
place Streamline ‘Moderne’ characteristics on everyday items because these characteristics where associated with the future and better times that laid ahead. This started to get people to buy items, as they wanted pieces of design that would give them a taste of the future now. As Streamline ‘Moderne’ designers wanted to stand out compared to Art Deco designers they used investigate new and innovative production processes such as stamping and molding which were created; along with developments being made into new materials at the time such as aluminum, steel, vinyl, plywood and Bakelite de-
Materials
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Elements
The streamlining of transport in the 1920‘s made the shipping of materials to the USA more efficient and affordable, allowing American designers to use a range of materials that they wouldn’t usually have had access to. Aluminium, chromium, plywood and vinyl were being used by designers to make appliances that were considered futuristic novelties. Everyone wanted to be a part of the exciting new future that these products symbolized. One of the most popular materials used in this period was Chromium, also known as Chrome. Chrome is a hard and brittle, silver metal that is used to manufacture stainless steel by hardening it and preventing rust and corrosion. Stainless steel was another popular choice of the streamliner designers as steel was used in creating aerospace structures and large sleek buildings during the Art Deco period; structures such as the William Van Alen’s Chrysler Building, which is still standing today. The most common material used in streamline designs is aluminium, a light, silver metal that is vital to the aerospace industry due to its durability and lightness. Products made from aluminium were extremely popular in the 1920’s as they were known to have been made from the same durable material as airplanes and therefore were considered trustworthy.
The materials were used in geometric designs similar to those used in Art Deco, designs that were quick and easy to produce. Plastic materials such as Bakelite, Plexiglas, vinyl and polystyrene were all invented in this period and immediately caught the attention of streamline designers. Bakelite was particularly useful in the electrical and automobile industries because of its extraordinary high resistance to heat and electricity. The plastic could be poured into, or injected into, moulds that created rounded corners, creating the sleek and clean appearance that was sought after by streamline designers.
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Norman Bel Geddges Industrial Designer 1893 - 1958
“Leading
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Raymond Loewy, Walter Dorwin Teague, Norman Bel Geddes and Gilbert Rohde, were the leading creators behind the streamline design movement and built the foundations of its dynamics and aesthetics.
locomotiv Raymond Loewy was a French-born American industrial designer, known as the “father of streamline design”. Loewy is responsible for the establishment of industrial design as a profession and was a huge name in the design industry for more than half a century, due to his influence on the movement. Loewy was an artist, a business man and an inventor. His began his carrier as a designer by simplifying household appliances, consequently making them safer, easier to use and more aesthetically pleasing. His true passion lied in the design of trains, which is evident is his book, Locomotive, in which he comments on a series of steam engine trains from various parts of the world. Loewy’s design of the streamlined, art deco styled, S1 locomotive train, at 42.74m was the longest reciprocating locomotive ever made. In 1945, alongside five other designers, he established the corporation, Loewy Associates, which was soon to become the largest industrial design firm in the world. In 1950, an article in the cosmopolitan magazine stated: “Loewy has probably affected the daily life of more americans than any other man of his time”.
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My youth was charmed by the glamour of the Locomotive. I am still under its spell and in this volume I would rather write about the beauty of the magnificent creature to whom I owe some of my most cherished souvenirs. - Raymond Lowey
Walter Dorwin Teague was an industrial designer, architect, illustrator, graphic designer, writer, and entrepreneur. While Raymond Loewy was known as the “father of Streamline design”, Dorwin was referred to as the ‘Dean of Industrial Design”. His profession within industrial Design began alongside Norman Bel Geddes, Raymond Loewy and Henry Dreyfuss, who, together, founded the ‘The society of industrial design’ in 1914. His work was well known for its traditional concepts despite later evolving to more modernistic values. Throughout America he was recognised as a critical figure in the spread of mid-century modernism and streamline design. One of his most well known designs was the ‘Tiny Baby Brownie’ camera he created for Kodak. Using plastic he managed to warp and mould the camera into a sleek,
minimal and stylish shape. Norman Bel Geddes’ work mainly focused on aerodynamics and vehicles. Over the years he produced a number of futuristic concepts concerning the designs of trains, ocean liners, airplanes and cars. His ‘teardrop-shaped automobile’ was a prime example of streamline design. The unique characteristics of the car not only served as a bold manifestation of streamline design but also provided excellent visibility, thanks to its enlarged curves, rounded windshield and arched windows. The vehicle was without doubt a masterpiece of its time. Geddes had great confidence in the streamline movement, his slogan was ‘I can see the future’. Gilbert Rohde was an industrial designer and marketing adviser for important companies like the Heywood-Wakefield Company, the Widdicomb Company, and the Troy Sunshade Company, the most influential businesses of their time. Rohde was considered to be more of an engineer than an artist, using a thought process as a means to produce his work instead of visuals and pre fabricated ideas. When fusing tradition with innovation he created entirely original designs. He experimented with different materials and styles to create a wide variety of chair designs, which resulted in huge
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