Art deco turns 100

When the descriptor “art deco” is used in an architectural context, images of gilded entrances, decorative metal flourishes, and sleek expressions come to mind. Think of the Empire State Building or the American Radiator Building, structures in which the raucous but fashionable energy of the Roaring Twenties was solidified into built form. In a cultural context, it evokes scenes of the era it spawned, when crowds filed into cinema buildings with crown-like marquee signage to watch moving pictures on a large screen, or whispered passwords to gain entrance to hidden speakeasies, where stools lined bar counters and friends assembled in banquette seating to drink in secret.

Art deco, short for Arts Décoratifs, turns 100 years old this year. In celebration of this, AN looks back at the style’s origins and its relevance today.

A Definitive Origin

On April 29, 1925, the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris opened, formally introducing the style to a global audience. While it hit the scene at this expo, its decorative influences are rooted in a rich mix of styles that date farther back than Art Nouveau—its de facto predecessor—to Cubism, Constructivism, and even Egyptology.

The International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts was planned for 1915, but it was delayed by the onset of World War I. The exhibition’s inception is traced to French and other European decorative artists, furniture makers, and architects—including Eugène Grasset, Hector Guimard, Francis Jourdain, Maurice Dufrêne, Paul Follot, and Pierre Chareau— who held a series of salons that led to the expo’s creation.

The principal architect of the festival was Charles Plumet, while other architects—including Jean Hiriart, Georges Triboul, Georges Beau, and Le Corbusier—designed pavilions for the showcase. Pavilions exhibited furniture and objects, and many were built for department stores to show off products. These structures were flanked with symmetrical entryways with sculptural, column elements and the decorative, almost mural-like treatment we still expect to see from art deco buildings today. Inside the pavilions, opulent chandeliers and rooms wrapped in busy wallpaper were exhibition grounds for the latest chairs, tables, and fixtures designed in what was then deemed “modern” style—not unlike the international design fairs staged today.

While looked at as a rather decorative style, it took several engineering and technological advances to develop art deco architecture as we know it. Among these innovations were the invention and application of reinforced concrete, new methods in producing plate glass, and the mass production of aluminum.

Art deco’s appearance in Paris gave way to an adoption of the style elsewhere. In 1931, the Empire State Building was completed in New York—not only an early art deco landmark, but the tallest building in the world at the time and for decades following. To this day the luster of its gilded lobby bustles with office workers during the morning and evening rushes, and tourists marveling at its aluminum reliefs and marble walls. The cosmopolitan ideal spread across the country, as art deco reared the ornamentation and grandeur we’ve now come to expect from department stores of the era.

From art deco emerged streamline moderne, a response to an advancing world and a preference for the newest. Marked by long horizontal lines and a refined use of curves, the style is synonymous with transportation and appliances. Its cylindrical forms and smoothed concrete took root in Miami Beach, on the bodies of boats and trains, and on downtown street corners in the form of diners.

A Resurgence of Popularity

The adage everything that’s old is new again rings true with art deco, as the style has recently reappeared on the design scene in full force. Restaurants and bars like Katsuya, designed by Rockwell Group, riff on the style’s sumptuous geometric shapes and symmetrical qualities. A reverence for stone, bronze, and stainless steel places the SHoP Architects–designed Brooklyn Tower among the long and growing list of New York City buildings that reference art deco.

A handful of current exhibitions explore art deco’s relevance: See Deco at 100, which runs through June 15 at the Nassau County Art Museum in Roslyn, New York. And mark your calendars: 1925-2025. One Hundred Years of Art Deco opens in October at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and will run into early 2026.

Art deco was of its time—the 1920s and ’30s was an era of cataclysms, from Prohibition to the emergence of film, important advances in technology and transportation, and the stock market crash of 1929. A century later, as nostalgia beckons for simpler times and the world seems topsy-turvy, it makes sense that art deco’s opulence is in high demand today.