You’ve probably heard of the space race? Or maybe you are familiar with images of glamorised air travel? But have you ever heard of the Blue Riband…? Sea travel was the major way for passengers to travel long distances until the dawn of the jet age and remained a viable alternative to flight until around the 1960s. Crossing the Atlantic captured the imaginations of several countries who competed to win the Blue Riband - an accolade given to the commercial passenger liner crossing the Atlantic Ocean with the highest average speed. People travelled in style - the boat interiors were opulent.

SS Normandie (image from the historypress.co.uk)
In the early 20th century, several European liners became renowned for their sumptuous interiors that were filled with works by artisans and artists of their respective nations. In the 1910s there was a focus on replicating famous works of art and architecture in interiors. The 1920s saw a development of the Art Nouveau and Art Deco styles influencing the décor, with contemporary artists and architects being commissioned to design for the liner interiors. Different areas of the boat were designed differently – with the first-class areas being the most ornately designed. The 1930s saw the development of the most decoratively ambitious ships yet – limitations on US immigration meant that luxury tourists were the new bread and butter fares - their expectations had to be surpassed. Big, fast, exuberant ocean liners were national symbols of pride in the 1930s. Surface artworks were a big part in creating the spectacular interiors – helping transform them into symbols of modernity.

Adolphe Cassandre’s iconic poster for SS Normandie
SS Normandie was launched in 1932 and cost 812 million francs – she was built in Saint-Nazaire for the French Line Compagnie Generale Transatlantique (CGT) with large subsidies from the French government. She carried Colette and Hemingway, Noel Coward and Irving Berlin, and even the Von Trapp family of singers. Described as a femme fatale by Ludwig Bemelmans (author or Madeline), she was designed to represent France in the contest of the great liners – using French parts built in a French shipyard. Using one-tenth of the total cost of the ship, Pierre Patout designed the interior in the Art Deco and Streamline Moderne styles (the latter of which comprises curves and long horizontal lines with nautical elements and is a style that was borne out of ocean liners or paquebots’). The interiors were opulent and luxurious – with first-class suites each individually designed. The first-class dining hall was spectacularly lined with lalique glass that was illuminated from within – seating 700 people, the length of the room was longer than the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles (!). This room earned the boat the nickname ‘Ship of Light’. Meanwhile the first-class smoking room was panelled in murals which showed ancient Egyptian life, the pool was lined with ornate mosaic, and even the children’s nursery was decorated by Jean de Brunhoff with depictions of Barbar, the fictional elephant. Jean Dunand’s gold lacquer panels in the smoking room were particularly incredible. Harold Wilson once said that ‘the whole interior was…like an exposition des arts decoratifs’.

SS Normandie, First Class Dining Room

Les Sports, by Jean Dunand for the first class smoking room of SS Normandie
(in Paris Musées Collection), (mural in gold lacquered bas-relief)
Meanwhile, the British were vying for competition with French and Germans (with Bremen) – completing her maiden voyage in 1936, RMS Queen Mary competed with SS Normandie for the Blue Riband. Due to the Great Depression, Cunard applied to the British Government for a loan which was granted. The boat cost £3.5 million at the time (equivalent to more than £200 million in 2024). She was more conservative in design compared to the Normandie and some critiqued this decorative restraint. Even so, her interior was in the Art Deco style with British artists being commissioned to decorate the ship’s surfaces including Edward Wadsworth and Andreas Duncan Carse. The Bromsgrove Guild of Applied Arts created many of the decorative elements on the boat – they were a group of artists and designers who were part of the Arts and Crafts movement. A mural in the main dining room even included a lit crystal model that mirrored the route progress of the Queen Mary.

Mural in the main dining room of the Queen Mary (with crystal model mapping the journey)
These ships, and others of the time, represent the golden age of maritime transatlantic travel and so much design both architectural and interior has been inspired by their glamour. Many of these boats were stripped of their décor and transformed into military ships in WWII with artwork now being privately held. In the 50s, there were several new boats that were designed in the energy of the time with fantastic interiors utilising new materials and aesthetics – such as SS United States, but by the 60s and 70s most of these ocean liners became obsolete as air travel became the default.


Charle Lin Tissot's 'Snowflake Crystal Montage' for SS United States, in crystal and aluminium, 1952 (in the collection of SS United States Conservancy)
From a surface artwork perspective, there was incredible usage of murals, sculptures, marquetry, and decorative panelling that transformed the interiors of ocean liners into the legendary icons that they became. Even though the days of luxury ocean liner travel were numbered, at Superficial we are still inspired by the use of design to act as signifiers of modernity and the investment in surface artwork on the vessels.

Art Deco decorated bedroom on the SS Normandie - look at all the surface art!
Today, in yacht interior design, we see glimpses of the spirit of the golden age as designers innovate with new materials and use historic references to transform boats into new lively spaces reflecting the aspirations of our own time...