Ward Furniture Display, 1964 New York World's Fair, Perspective

The New York World’s Fair of 1964–65 was a celebration of technology and American consumer culture, planned by a team that included Viennese-born architect Victor Gruen, the inventor of the modern shopping mall. At the fair, the Pavilion of American Interiors presented visitors with a vision of the hightech domestic spaces of the future, including a range of automated home appliances and new synthetic fabrics. In this exhibit design for a new line of furniture, architect and designer Henry P. Glass took advantage of the pavilion’s round glass structure to showcase his interior design with built-in cabinetry, vividly colored and pattered textiles, and a bead curtain room divider. Standing at the intersection of mid-century modernism and the psychedelic culture of the 1960s and 1970s, these bright, chemically produced fabrics loudly proclaim the future of design.