Decorative Design in Mexican Homes

Discussing the contemporaneity of his country’s past, Edmundo O’Gorman once observed that “history walks the streets of Mexico.” And this beautiful book makes clear that history inhabits Mexican houses as well. Mexico’s architects and interior decorators draw with rare skill from the rich heritage of ancient Indian cultures and of colonial New Spain, using old treasures or ancient themes in a thoroughly modern setting. Somehow it does not appear incongruous, for example, to find a replica of a great stone head from La Venta set against a wall of steel-reinforced concrete. These are certainly not typical houses; they are the residences of Mexico’s well-to-do. Nonetheless, they can teach us much about a country which has managed to preserve and combine the best of its many cultural influences.