Aesthetics for a polite society University of Antwerp
The late early modern period witnessed critical consumer transitions across Europe. Yet, while the explosion of the material world and the transition from an 'old luxury' material culture to a 'new luxury' model is well documented, our understanding of the underlying value systems of consumer goods is still under-developed. Building on a database of eighteenth-century advertisements for household auctions in the London-based Daily Advertiser, ...