Today’s home is filled with pieces from Pottery Barn, IKEA, and Crate & Barrel, and we pore over glossy catalogs in hopes of achieving the “modern interior.” This idealized aesthetic is the subject of Penny Sparke’s study, as she explores the style in bot its absolute form and the diverse decorating approaches seen in the contemporary home. The shift from Victorian to modern style, The Modern Interior reveals, was not as simple and smooth as it is often perceived and the book probes the complicted history behind that transition. Sparke examines the work of such designers as Marcel Breuer, Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles and Ray Eames, and Mies van der Rohe, and draws upon design examples from the United States and Europe to reveal that, unlike the esigned exteriors of buildings and institutions, the idea of the “interior” has been a largely abstract conception promoted through exhibitions, retail stores, and mass media. A comprehensive and in-depth investigation of...