Beautiful disorder, exception to the rule: the development of a new design aesthetic

In the last chapter, the book returns to the work of architects. It argues that architects’ engagement with popular journals helped shape new interior decorating styles by examining the projects undertaken by architect Alexandre Sandier and sponsored by the popular journal the Revue Illustrée. The chapter ultimately claims that imagination and theming played a most important role in the development of the profession of interior designer as well as in the formulation of new decorative styles such as Art Nouveau. These two developments are inextricably linked and cannot be understood in separation from each other.