Modern Interiors Research Centre (MIRC)
Revolutionising modern interior design: Exploring history, theory, and innovation at Kingston School of Art.
Identity and Habitation: Modern Interiors Research Centre
World's leader in interiors and their contents
Modern Interiors Research Centre is dedicated to the study of interiors and their contents from the mid 19th century to the present day. Research is historically focused and consideration is also given to contemporary practice and theory.
The Research Centre places its emphasis is on identity and habitation – the experience of being inside spaces. It explores the interior as an interface between architecture and designed objects. Research fields include design and architectural history; and visual, material, personal and spatial culture.
Part of a large international network
The overarching aim of the Research Centre is to create a body of knowledge that will inform interior design knowledge worldwide. The centre stages conferences and events and engages with international authorities and institutions. It works with, for example, partners as diverse as the V&A and the Museum of the Home (former Geffrye Museum) to the Universities of Melbourne and Oviedo.
Interiors in the Era of Covid-19
Interior Design between the Public and Private Realms
Edited by Penny Sparke, Ersi Ioannidou, Pat Kirkham, Stephen Knott and Jana Scholze.
Research projects and publications
This collaborative and multidisciplinary research project was commissioned for the 12th Design Biennale Saint-Étienne. It explored the relationship between the home and design in the past, present and future through five core themes: Utopia, Shelter, Identities, Wellbeing and Connected. Sparke, Scholze and Rossi worked with exhibition designers Plaid and graphic designer Lombaert Studio to realise the practice-based research project. The researchers are currently working on an accompanying publication.
This research was commissioned by English Heritage (now Historic England) to highlight the threat to Bristol's pubs. Declining trade has resulted in loss of historic buildings and interiors as pubs are demolished or converted for housing and other uses.
The research identified a number of less well protected and vulnerable categories of public house as well as a number of buildings of interest for further detailed study.
This was a collaborative and multi-disciplinary research project for the 14th Venice Architecture Biennale. It was a curated installation of work (film and soundtrack) from across Kingston School of Art. It told the story of Space Electronic, a disco opened in Florence in 1969 by Gruppo 9999, members of Italy's Radical Architecture movement.
This interdisciplinary research investigated current design and application of Multi-Sensory Environments (MSEs) in dementia care (also referred to as 'Sensory Rooms' in a care-home context), including aesthetic qualities and functional parameters. Because little documented design guidance for such interiors for older people with dementia exists, the research focused on establishing new knowledge from which coherent, user-centred design solutions were developed.
Interiors in the Era of Covid-19: Interior Design between the Public and Private Realms, Bloomsbury, 2023
Editors: Penny Sparke, Ersi Ioannidou, Pat Kirkham, Stephen Knott and Jana Scholze
Shaping the American Interior: Structures, Contexts and Practices, Routledge, 2018
Editors: Paula Lupkin and Penny Sparke
Flow: Interior, Landscape and Architecture in the Era of Liquid Modernity, Bloomsbury, 2018
Editors: Patricia Brown, Patricia Lara-Betancourt, Gini Lee, Penny Sparke, Mark Taylor
Architectures of Display: Department Stores and Modern Retail (Routledge, 2017)
Editors: Patricia Laraâ Betancourt, Anca I. Lasc and Margaret Maile Petty
The Routledge Companion to Design Studies, Routledge, 2016
Editors: Fiona Fisher and Penny Sparke
British Design: Tradition and Modernity After 1948, Bloomsbury, 2015
Editors: Christopher Breward, Fiona Fisher, Ghislaine Wood
Interiors: Design Architecture Culture 5/2 (2014): 131 -139. Special Issue: Seductive Discourses: design advice for the home
Editors: Emma Hardy and Patricia Lara-Betancourt
Biography, Identity and the Modern Interior (Ashgate, 2013)
Editors: Penny Sparke, Anne Massey
Performance, Fashion and the Modern Interior: From the Victorians to Today (Berg, 2011)
Editors: Fiona Fisher, Trevor Keeble, Patricia Lara-Betancourt, Brenda Martin
Designing the Modern Interior: From the Victorians to Today (Berg, 2009)
Editors: Penny Sparke, Anne Massey, Trevor Keeble, Brenda Martin
The Modern Period Room, The Construction of the Exhibited Interior 1870-1950 (Routledge, 2006)
Editors: Penny Sparke, Brenda Martin, Trevor Keeble
Women's Places: Architecture and Design 1860-1960 (Routledge, 2003)
Editors: Penny Sparke and Brenda Martin
The Multi-Sensory Environment image gallery
Join the Centre
The Centre welcomes PhD applications in any subject related to the modern interior. As a research student at Kingston University you will become part of a strong and ambitious postgraduate community. You will be fully supported by a rich programme of research training, including research workshops, seminars, guest lectures, symposia, and related activities organised through the research centres.
