The Interior Decoration of Ocean Liners: A Chapter of Italian Design History

It is widely recognized that in the years leading up to the Second World War, Italian design firms were created and expanded, as did the culture of design and architecture. This ferment fostered new ideas in the development of the phenomenon of Italian design and the features of Italian interior architecture which in this period took shape and attracted growing attention. In this context, the interior decoration of the great Italian ocean liners played a fundamental role. Their interiors were designed by some of the main figures of Italian architectural history: on one hand their projects produced a new naval style; on the other they contained many of the peculiarities of the Italian approach to interior decoration. The article explores the relationship between the design of Italian ocean liners and the development of Italian interior design. It aims to demonstrate that the interior decoration of these ships not only represented an opportunity for the growth of designers, industries, and countries from an economic view point, but that it also led to important opportunities for experimentation within the field of art and architecture, while encouraging the creation of continuing collaboration between art and industry that today still characterizes Italian design.