Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things

How do we define ‘taste’? The only certainty is that it shifts and changes – sometimes abruptly. With the explosion of vulgar consumerism in the mid-19th century, the Victorians seized upon the notion of ‘good taste’ as a way of codifying middle-class mores. A century later, to talk about taste had become almost taboo, since judgments made about dress, manners, food and art can often be painfully revealing. And today? When this classic text was first published in 1991, Stephen Bayley illuminated the nuances and niceties of our mercurial understanding of taste. In this new edition, he ranges far and wide to bring us exquisitely up to date.