Interior Architecture – Hôtel de Mortemart (c. 1600 CE – c. 1700 CE)

You will be allocated a period from one of the three covered in this course.
1 Imperial Rome (c. 20 BCE – c. 500 CE)
2 Western Europe (c. 1420 CE – c. 1600 CE)
3 Western Europe (c. 1600 CE – c. 1700 CE)
4 Western Europe (c.1700 – 1800 CE)
From your allocated period your tutor will assign you a case study that will form the basis of the Assessment
task.
1 You will be required to describe the dwelling:
• Name of dwelling (If applicable).
• Location (GPS, City/town or address if known).
• Country/state (at time of construction and contemporary)
• Year of construction, or completion, or year of design (any of these as long as it is clearly stated which one
you have chosen. If unknown, then you should give an approximate year).
• Designer (If known. If known, give full name and birth date and death date).
• Patron (If known. If known, give full name and birth date and death date. If patron unknown then describe
possible social/financial position of the patron).
• Typology of dwelling (i.e. is it an urban house or a rural house? Is it an aristocratic palace or a merchant’s
house?).
• Morphology of the dwelling (i.e. architectural and spatial form, number of stories etc., major features and
construction materials). You will need to use the vocabulary covered in this course.
2 You will be required to diagram the spatial arrangement of the dwelling (one diagram for each of the points
below. The drawings must be your own original work.
• Spatial sequence/axis
• Circulation
• Functions
• Connection between exterior/interior
• Service/served spaces
• Gendered/hierarchical spaces
3 In no more than 1200 words, you will need to describe the case study in relation to:
• Society and culture 400 words
o Socio-political contexts
o Societal and gender structures
o Health and hygiene and life expectancy
o Science and technology
o The arts• General description of the dwelling and how it was a mirror of its time 400 words
Use the above categories and your analyses from the diagrams to help you write your description. Frame
the discussion through the lenses of:
o symbolism and society
o technologies (lighting, heating, services, etc).
o sleeping/washing/sanitation
o gathering/meeting/entertaining
o food preparation and consumption
o rituals (birth/deaths etc.)
• Objects and artifacts 400 words
What were typical objects and artifacts that would have been found and used at the time in your case
study dwelling? And how do these relate to the categories in the previous section (i.e. food preparation
and consumption)? Images will need to be correctly captioned and referenced.
o 2 x Artworks
o 3 x Furniture (beds, chairs, tables, cupboards etc)
o 1 x fabric (curtains, upholstery, wall coverings, floor coverings, blankets, etc)
o 3x decorative arts (porcelain, ceramics, metal work, glass, clocks, table settings, vases etc)
o 2 x Household items associated (toys, kitchenware, sanitation, devotional, musical etc).
o 1 x object of related to lighting (lamps, candle holders, chandeliers etc).