Designing Liners

A History of Interior Design Afloat

Anne Massey

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000226379
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Arquitectura
• Subtopic: Diseño de interiores

Designing Liners: A History of Interior Design Afloat covers the interior design of these floating palaces from the mid-nineteenth century to the twenty-first century.

In this new edition, the design heritage of the ocean liner is also explored in this age of a growing holiday cruise market. The book offers the first history and analysis of this highly significant aspect of the design of interiors, which mirrors and reinforces cultural assumptions about national identity, gender, class, and ethnicity. The interiors of ocean liners reflect the changing hierarchies of society and shifting patterns of globalization. The trajectory of the professionalization of interior design is the connecting narrative of the book, from the local decorating firm to the internationally renowned architect. It is an important addition to interior design research and takes this transitory building type as its subject.

This book provides the first survey of the transient history of interior design in relation to the development of passenger shipping. The history of these great ship interiors is tracked, from their commissioning by the line owners; the materials, methods, and sources for the initial creation; their construction; their use; and their reception. The demise and re-purposing of the interiors is also covered in this new edition, with additional material on the South African Union Castle and P & O Lines.

Drawing on a broad range of original research, Anne Massey's approach combines interior design studies, design history, architectural history, and maritime studies. The new edition has been carefully designed to include black and white and colour illustrations.

1

DECORATING TECHNOLOGY

The dominant discourse of ocean liner travel is one of luxury and glamour, high design and nostalgia. As the publication to accompany the exhibition Ocean Liners: Glamour, Speed and Style affirms, ‘Ocean Liners explores the design of Victorian and Art Deco “floating palaces”, sleek post-war liners as well as these ships' impact on avant-garde artists and architects such as Le Corbusier’ (Finamore and Wood 2017: inside cover). Whilst luxurious travel may have been the experience of a certain class of passenger from the late nineteenth century onwards, travellers, in total, before this time did not enjoy such an experience. Indeed, to travel at all was a sign of prestige: ‘Until the nineteenth century being able to travel, particularly for non-work reasons, was only available to a narrow elite and was itself a mark of status' (Urry 1995: 130).

Travel by sea before and during most of the nineteenth century (and the advent of steam power, and attempts to provide luxurious surroundings) was a very uncomfortable experience for the majority of travellers. The Industrial Revolution gave rise to exceptional technological innovations in all areas of transport, beginning with train travel, which then impacted upon sailing, but the design of the interiors of both modes of transport mirrored social hierarchies and traditional terrestrial forms of decoration. Indeed, the initial stimulus to provide liners came from the need to transport mail and cargo more speedily, rather than the necessity to move passengers around the globe. Therefore, the interior design of the ships was considered less important than their safety and speed.

The nineteenth century witnessed the transformation of ship construction from timber to iron, as the impact of the Industrial Revolution and modernity was felt. This was paralleled by the transition from sail to steam power. It was during this period that the economic and political climate stimulated a growth in sea travel for the purposes of both trade and emigration, with the beginnings of the colonisation of many parts of the world by Britain, France, Holland, Portugal, and Spain. Before the era of mass passenger sea travel in the late nineteenth century, ships were designed to carry the optimum cargo and often incorporated means of defence, and considerations of passenger comfort were not a high priority.

For the majority of this period, responsibility for the interior design of the ships lay mainly with the shipbuilder, who would, in turn, delegate this work to the carpenters. As Adrian Forty argued in Objects of Desire, ‘In every industry, design has become necessary as a separate activity in production once a single craftsman ceases to be responsible for every stage of manufacture from conception to sale’ (1986: 29). The British modernist John de la Valette concurred when he argued that in this era, ‘The style of the “Foreman Joiner” developed from the fact that all the fittings and decoration of ships was at first carried out by the shipbuilders and consequently devolved upon their foreman joiner. The result was invariably suitable, thoroughly solid work. But where it came to working out a “high-class job”, the tendency to “put a little more art” into it, usually meant adding extraneous ornament or using materials because they were expensive, often with garish result, albeit in the taste of the day’ (1936: 706). The situation began to change during the second half of the nineteenth century, when the appearance of the interiors became an important commercial factor in attracting passengers, as the number of passenger lines and liners grew. This was paralleled by a marked escalation in the activity of the decorating firms, as upper and middle class taste in decoration blossomed. Decorating firms, such as the plasterers George Jacksons & Sons, were employed to add decorative plasterwork to the interiors of three significant ships, the SS Great Western, SS Great Britain, and SS Great Eastern. These early liners were highly significant in terms of technological innovation, and nineteenth century crowds marvelled at this spectacle of modernity; the huge machinery contrasting with the decoration on board. Just as the traditional skills of the shipwright/carpenter were perceived as being eroded by decorating firms, they were also eroded from a different direction – that of the replacement of wood by iron and sail by steam.

Sea voyages up until the early nineteenth century were still dominated by the traditional wooden sailing ship. Built from oak, with complex rigging and canvas sails, the cabins and public spaces were comparatively sparse and not purpose built for passengers. The most prestigious areas to be decorated at all were the captain's and officers' quarters, as exemplified in the extant battleship Victory or the Cutty Sark. For example, during the 66 day voyage in 1620 of the Mayflower from Plymouth, England, to North America, the 102 passengers lived primarily on the gun deck. This was the deck sandwiched between the hold and the top deck. It offered cramped living space, measuring 80 feet from stem to stern, of which about 12 feet at the back belonged to the gun room and would have been off-limits to the passengers. The width at the widest part was approximately 24 feet. An assortment of hatches provided access to the cargo hold below. The windlass and capstan, both used to haul heavy items by rope between the decks, also took up floor space, as did the main mast in the middle and the sprit sail mast in the front. Many of the families built small “cabins” for themselves – simple wooden dividers nailed together to provide some privacy. Others, especially the single young men, slept where they could, some finding shelter in a shallop, a 30-foot sailing vessel that the passengers had brought with them and which was stowed on the gun deck. There was barely room for all the passengers to lie down and sleep in the 1,800 square feet of deck space. There was no concept of the ship needing to be designed to meet passenger needs, only those of the senior crew.

The wealthiest travellers could ensure a comparatively comfortable passage by paying the captain for a private cabin, as it was within his power to do so. As the majority of these passengers were emigrating, they brought their own furniture and furnishings with which to fill the cabin. This would usually include a bed and trunk. But the majority of those who travelled had few possessions and endured the cramped and dark conditions of steerage, where you were responsible for cooking your own food and the only sleeping accommodation was on the deck. The majority of emigrants in the nineteenth century travelled steerage class on sailing packets, transported more as cargo than human beings. The smell and noise on these ships was notoriously bad, from the constant creaking of the timbers and stench of so many human beings travelling in such close proximity for so long.

The sailing times of the sailing ships were completely unpredictable, and depended solely on the weather. As the Industrial Revolution gathered pace in Britain during the early nineteenth century the impetus to apply steam power to sailing grew, and the innovations of the railways were applied to ships. Also, the desire to make ships larger and more robust was a further pressing need as the volume of cargo and distances travelled increased. Hence, work began on applying steam power to sailing vessels. The immediate challenge was to make the engines efficient, so that the amount of coal that needed to be carried was not prohibitive. At first, steam power was applied to small vessels undertaking short trips. For example, the Comet was a wooden paddle steamer, the first to offer a regular service between Glasgow, Greenock, and Helensburgh on the Clyde from 1812. The ship was only 40 feet long and offered sparse accommodation. There were several wooden benches on deck and a small cabin aft, for which passengers paid the premium fare of four shillings to use. It contained a table with benches on either side. For a fare of three shillings there was also limited accommodation in a small forecastle, reached by a wooden ladder. The Comet ran ashore in 1820, but proved that offering a regular steam-powered service was a possibility, her small size restraining the possible profits. Steamers were launched on the Thames and were pioneered on route between Britain and Ireland during the early nineteenth century. In America, small-scale steamers appeared in the late eighteenth century, with the introduction of a steamboat service on the Delaware River by John Fitch. In 1807, Robert Fulton's North River Steam Boat (later renamed the Clermont) began operating on the Hudson River, from New York to Albany. The longer route from North America to Britain was first successfully completed with steam power by the American boat Savannah in 1819; however, the majority of the 30-day journey was made under sail and it carried no cargo or passengers. The ship had the appearance of a traditional square-rigger, complete with three masts and sails, but with the addition of a funnel, paddle wheels either side, and an engine below. The interior was reportedly sumptuous; the state cabin had mahogany wainscoting, rosewood and brass decorations, and full-length mirrors carefully placed to create the illusion of space, and it contained berths for 32 passengers. This was the style of the traditional river boat. The first voyage with paying passengers for the ship had been the short trip from Savannah to Charleston in April 1819, just before the Savannah sailed for Liverpool.

Apart from naval battles and travel to America and Australia, India was the other major destination for British ships. The expansion of trade with the East India Company and the deployment of the British in India to maintain the interests of the Empire meant a significant increase in sea travel. The growth in trade by sea in the nineteenth century was immense; in 1801, British mercantile shipping totalled 1,726,000 tons, and by 1846 it had reached 3,220,685 tons (Holmes 1906: 205). The most predominant shipping company in Britain was the East India Company, which traded mainly with India and through coercive action completely controlled the country by the late eighteenth century. The 1784 India Act had established the East India Company as the major trading arm of the British government. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the company's control extended across most of India, Burma, Singapore, and Hong Kong, and a fifth of the world's population was under its authority. In 1858, the company lost its administrative function to the Crown, and India became a formal Crown colony. The company was formally disbanded in 1874. By this stage, the East India Company had been eclipsed by the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P & O).

The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (renamed P & O in 1840) originated in 1837 and was founded to sail regular services to Portugal, Spain, and Gibraltar based on a mail contract with the British government. The delivery of overseas mail had formerly been the responsibility of the Admiralty. This important source of income allowed the line owners, Arthur Anderson, Brodie McGhie Willcox, and Richard Bourne, to build up a successful fleet for the transport of mail, cargo, passengers, and cruises to the Mediterranean region, India, and Australia. The interiors of P & O ships differed from those designed for the trans-Atlantic trade or as mammoth symbols of modernity. The ships needed to be reliable and provide comfortable accommodation in tropical climates. The company bought two ships, the Oriental and the Great Liverpool, in 1840 for the newly won mail contract to Alexandria in Egypt. Both steamers were originally intended for sailing the Atlantic. In 1842, the company won an important contract from the British government to offer sailings between the Suez and India, the first regular and reliable service between Britain and India. For this they needed to commission two new ships, the Hindostan launched in 1842 and the Bentick launched one year later. The two ships were wooden hybrid steam paddles with the addition of sails and iron bulkheads, and provision for 102 first class and 50 second class passengers.

Traditional in design, with striking windows at the stern like traditional warships, they were more radical in their interior layout. The convention was to lay the cabins on either side of the saloon, as was the case with Isambard Kingdom Brunel's SS Great Britain (1843). This layout was reversed, with the saloon spanning the full width of the ship across the stern, two corridors leading from it on either side of the ship, and a double set of cabins either side – 60 in all. The theory was that the passengers would not be so close to the noises of the sea and the passages would provide extra ventilation during the heat of tropical journeys. The saloon, at the stern of the ship beneath the upper deck, was decorated with painted panels. One passenger who travelled on the Hindostan in 1844 complained,

She had a superb saloon, every panel of which is decorated with an elegant and costly painting on papier mache by an artist of taste and skill. Perhaps too much money has been lavished on mere embellishments. Pictures and finely carved woodwork are on the whole of that part of the ship which is fitted up for passengers, most of whom would be glad to go in vessels with less costly decorations at a lower charge. All this finery makes the ship look as if she were meant rather for holiday pleasure-trips on a smooth lake, than to brave the dangers of the wide ocean. (P&O 1844: 2–3)

The saloon was the only public room for use by all first class passengers, so it was used for dining, reading, writing, and playing cards or board games, and for musical soirees. It was furnished with one central table with benches, a sideboard at the forward end, and a settee situated beneath the stern windows. Another contemporary commentator, a ‘Madras Officer’, published his reflections on travelling on the Hindostan in 1846 with a more favourable view of the grand saloon:

The cuddy is a magnificent room, running as far aft as the stern posts, and as far forward as the situation of the engine room would permit. I forget the dimensions of this spacious apartment: suffice to say, that is large enough to hold four tables, with sufficient latitude to admit of the perambulations and running to and fro of the waiters, and a nice walk up and down of a rainy day. The sides, (or to be more explicit, the walls) of the sale a manger, are decorated with gaudy papier mache colourings, descriptive of various subjects: the stanchions and rudder-head, as well as the mast, (which was in the centre of the cabin) are all painted with flowers in the most Beautifully arranged groups I ever saw, tastefully embellished with fountains and jetties d'eau, and other ornaments. (A Madras Officer 1846: 11–12)

The cabins were similar in dimensions to those occupied by Charles Dickens, measuring a paltry seven by seven feet, with two to four bunks and the rudimentary washing facilities of a small sink, and they gained a very similar response from passengers:

Her accommodations for passengers are poor, cramped, and badly ventilated, built with the intentions, evidently, of cramming as many living souls into as small a space as possible. The number of people between decks, to say nothing of the fires in the engine room, renders the heat insufferable, in spite of the wind-sails down each hatchway. (A Madras Officer 1846: 8)

Despite making the cabins uncomfortably hot, the addition of steam power speeded up the journey to Calcutta and gave a greater freedom for picking routes according to distance and convenience rather than the whim of the weather conditions. By the time of the collapse of the East India Company in 1874, P & O was the established company for travel to the British Empire in India. The ships were a microcosm of the Empire, with first class occupied by the privileged white senior administrators or by civil servants of the Raj and their families. In second class were the servants of the first class passengers, including batmen for the army officers and the Indian ayahs, plus poorer passengers, including priests and missionaries. Emigrants to India, who would be few in number compared to on the trans-Atlantic route, would not travel by P & O ships but by cheaper emigrant ships. P & O was occasionally obliged to carry third class passengers as part of the mail contract, usually low-ranking soldiers and sailors. These passengers were normally upgraded to second class (P & O circular 23.7.1889).

The emigrant trade from Ireland and Great Britain, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Italy, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Poland, Estonia and Lithuania, Greece, Albania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Syria, and Armenia to North America was also booming at this time. From 1820 to 1920, 35 million emigrants made the daunting journey across the Atlantic in desperate search of a better life. Although the new technology of steam was used to pack more passengers into larger, faster boats, the conditions for most emigrants were appalling. Packed into tiny s...