Polskie międzywojenne poradnictwo w zakresie wnętrz mieszkalnych jako obszar relacji niemiecko‑polskich

Abstract

During the interwar period, Polish interior design consulting stimulated our national achievements; however, it did not happen in isolation from foreign trends. One of the most distinct influences were the accomplishments of German residential culture. The previous German influence had been coloured by negative associations: with the period under German occupation on the one hand, and with the outdated apartment functions and aesthetics based on the residential culture of the late 19th century and its neo-style furnishings on the other. Yet as early as in the late 1920s, a completely different German horizon began to appear, gaining popularity in the 1930s. Ever since then German interior design and furnishing achievements became synonymous with rationality, functionality, and even, broadly speaking, general modernity. It is therefore difficult to present an unambiguous diagnosis of the German-Polish relationship relating to habitation during the interwar period. On the one hand it was difficult to escape the tensions generated by political and national prejudices, and on the other, to evade the neighbouring German cultural achievements and their real and positive impact on many Polish accomplishments, especially in the realms of architecture and habitation. One may say that the emotional antagonism which could be seen during the 1920s faded with time and was displaced, at least among experts, by an awareness of the nearby existence of successful models which, thanks to specialist literature and books, along with visiting fairs and exhibitions, were well known and appreciated.