Jacket

The 1873 Vienna World´s Fair provides substantial momentum for the popularisation of oriental style and fashion in middle-class society. At the same time, domestic handicrafts are to be revitalised by drawing inspiration from the ample supply of exotic materials. Everything is “Orientalised”, from the timeless child’s fork to simple sofas and chairs. The Oriental Museum, founded in 1875, is intended to boost trade with the Orient; its basic inventory of arts and crafts is taken from the World‘s Fair. Eleven years later, the Oriental Museum is renamed the ‘Austrian Commercial Museum’. When Europe begins to flood the market with domestically produced and Orientalised articles, the exotic flavour of the Orient has already lost its magic. In 1925, the Austrian Commercial Museum is dissolved.