A century after its debut, Art Deco continues to influence modern design, from luxury cars to interior decorating trends. The distinctive style, which emerged from a French government exhibition in 1925, has proven remarkably enduring, bridging the gap between early 20th-century optimism and contemporary aesthetic sensibilities.
The movement began with France's ambitious International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris in 1925. The French government organized this showcase with one clear objective: to display and celebrate the excellence of French modern design. This exhibition of groundbreaking ideas helped launch what would become one of the most recognizable design movements in history, eventually known as Art Deco.
Originally developed in Western Europe during the 1910s, Art Deco gained prominence throughout the 1920s and reached its peak between World War I and World War II. In the United States, the style was called Art Moderne or Streamline Moderne, becoming a powerful symbol of American prosperity, optimism, and luxury during the Roaring Twenties. The era perfectly captured the spirit of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novels "The Beautiful and the Damned" (1922) and "The Great Gatsby" (1925), with their depictions of flappers and sheiks embracing frivolity, liberation, and hope.
Despite its widespread adoption, the term "Art Deco" faced early criticism from influential figures. Swiss-French architectural designer Le Corbusier, who is credited with coining the term (short for the French "arts décoratifs"), harshly criticized the new style in his journal "L'Esprit Nouveau," claiming that "modern decoration has no decoration." Similarly, historian Nikolaus Pevsner dismissed its "jazzy modernism" as a corruption of true modernism. The term wasn't officially established until 1968 with the publication of Bevis Hillier's book "Art Deco of the 20s and 30s," which solidified the style's name.
Hillier described Art Deco as "the last of the total styles," noting its influence on everything "from skyscrapers and luxury liners to powder compacts, thermos flasks, lampposts and letterboxes." This comprehensive reach reflected the era's embrace of the machine age, when technology was rapidly improving quality of life through innovations like the industrialized printing press, radio, the first skyscrapers, and modern transportation systems.
Stylistically, Art Deco represented a dramatic departure from earlier design movements. Its distinct machine aesthetic replaced the flowing, floral patterns of the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles that preceded it. Instead, the movement embraced streamlined, geometric designs that expressed the speed, power, and scale of modern technology. As Art Deco expert Alastair Duncan noted, "for the first time, the straight line became a source of beauty."
The style drew inspiration from multiple sources, including early 20th-century art movements like Cubism, Futurism, and Constructivism, as well as ancient exotic cultures of Egypt, Assyria, and Persia. Characteristic elements included zigzag patterns, sunburst motifs, and stylized flowers, combined with bright colors influenced by Fauvism, strong rectangular shapes, and innovative materials such as aluminum, stainless steel, chrome, and plastic.
While Art Deco originated in Europe, American architecture perhaps best defines the movement today. Iconic New York City buildings like the Chrysler Building, the Empire State Building, and Radio City Music Hall showcase the style's sleek, linear appearance with stylized, geometric ornamentation that transformed the city into a futuristic modern metropolis. These structures, with their soaring heights and decorative details, embodied the era's sense of excitement and anticipation for a future filled with promise and possibility.
The movement's influence extended beyond architecture into various art forms. Art Deco inevitably impacted filmmaking, most notably in Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" (1927), and later influenced 20th-century design styles like retrofuturism. The ornate Art Deco lobby of Radio City Music Hall, which opened in 1932, remains one of the most impressive examples of the style's application to interior spaces.
While painting isn't closely associated with Art Deco, Tamara de Lempicka's highly stylized portraits of aristocrats and socialites perfectly captured 1920s glamour and sophistication. Her work helped define "the new woman," a term originally coined in the late 19th century but which also referred to the generation of free-spirited women with liberal interpretations of gender roles in the early 20th century. Many of Lempicka's paintings featured nudes set against backgrounds of New York skyscrapers, with Cubist influences evident in her use of bold lines and geometric, angular shapes.
Lempicka's work experienced a resurgence in popularity during the late 1980s when celebrities including Jack Nicholson and Barbra Streisand expressed their admiration for her art. Madonna, an avid collector who has admitted to owning enough Lempicka paintings "to open a museum," referenced the artist's unique aesthetic in music videos for "Open Your Heart" (1987), "Express Yourself" (1989), and "Vogue" (1990), and included projections of Lempicka's paintings in her 2023-24 Celebration Tour.
Today, Art Deco's influence remains strong across multiple industries. In January 2025, Country and Town House magazine announced that "art deco is back for 2025" in interior design. The automotive industry has also embraced the style's revival, with Mercedes-Benz recently showcasing its new Vision Iconic show car featuring a dramatic radiator grille designed to evoke the golden era of 1930s automotive design. Jaguar created a pink show car earlier this year, with advertising that referenced the Art Deco architecture of Miami Beach, and released the new Jaguar Type 00 as part of the company's brand transformation, showing distinct Art Deco influences.
A century after its Parisian debut, the Art Deco movement continues to inspire designers and artists with its modernity, elegance, and freedom of form. The style creates a sense of nostalgia by juxtaposing perspectives from past and present, proving that the machine age aesthetic that once symbolized progress and optimism still resonates in our contemporary world. From luxury vehicles to interior design trends, Art Deco's enduring appeal demonstrates how great design transcends its original era to become truly timeless.
