Mid-century modern design may meet our needs even more now than when it first appeared, but that doesn't mean we should idolise the style, writes John Jervis.

I love mid-century modern, but it makes me sad. In its beauty and simplicity, it speaks of postwar optimism, and a belief in a better world ? one of prosperity and peace, with large homes and larger pay packets. It's not the fault of a bunch of attractive designs that this proved to be a mirage, even a fraud. But mid-century modern was wrapped up in that delusion, even contributed to it. And the design industry enjoyed, and continues to enjoy, the ride just a little too much.
In the 1950s, mid-century modern design promised a lifestyle free from markers of wealth and privilege, free of decorative excess, of clutter and dirt, free from the past. In reality, there were few progressive ideals involved. Before the war, modernist designers had struggled to bring their ideas to mass production, but still sought to raise living standards in cities, designing 'minimum dwellings' with floorplans, kitchens and furnishings calculated to maximize space and improve lives. Their postwar successors ? all those heroic, big-name designers we celebrate as prophets of a modern, democratic future ? turned out to be less public-spirited. When mass production of modernist designs became a reality, they chose lucrative careers working, almost exclusively, for high-end manufacturers.
Then, as now, class was deeply embedded in design's power...