Indoor America - The Interior Landscape of Postwar Suburbia (Hardcover)

Cars, single-family houses, fallout shelters, air-conditioned malls-these are only some of the many interiors making up the landscape of American suburbia. Indoor America explores the history of suburbanization through the emergence of such spaces in the postwar years, examining their design, use, and representation. By drawing on a wealth of examples ranging from the built environment to popular culture and film, Andrea Vesentini shows how suburban interiors were devised as a continuous cultural landscape of interconnected and self-sufficient escape capsules. The relocation of most everyday practices into indoor spaces has often been overlooked by suburban historiography; Indoor America uncovers this latent history and contrasts it with the dominant reading of suburbanization as pursuit of open space. Americans did not just flee the city by getting out of it-they did so also by getting inside. Vesentini chronicles this inner-directed flight by describing three separate stages. The encapsulation of the automobile fostered the nuclear segregation of the family from the social fabric and served as a blueprint for all other interiors. Introverted design increasingly turned the focus of the house inward. Finally, through interiorization, the exterior was incorporated into the all-encompassing interior landscape of enclosed malls and projects for indoor cities. In a journey that features tailfin cars and World's Fair model homes, Richard Neutra's glass walls and sitcom picture windows, Victor Gruen's Southdale Center and the Minnesota Experimental City, Indoor America takes the reader into the heart and viscera of America's urban sprawl.

General

Imprint:	University of Virginia Press
Country of origin:	United States
Series:	Midcentury: Architecture, Landscape, Urbanism, and Design
Release date:	November 2018
Authors:	Andrea Vesentini
Dimensions:	203 x 178mm (L x W)
Format:	Hardcover
Pages:	320
ISBN-13:	978-0-8139-4158-5
Categories:	Books > Arts & Architecture > History of art / art & design styles > General Books > Arts & Architecture > Architecture > General Books > Humanities > History > American history > General Books > History > American history > General
LSN:	0-8139-4158-X
Barcode:	9780813941585

Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate? Let us know about it.

Does this product have an incorrect or missing image? Send us a new image.

Is this product missing categories? Add more categories.

Review This Product

No reviews yet - be the first to create one!