Architecture is in an interesting crossroads today. When we look back at the ancient architecture, we see interior and exterior design to be inseparable from each other.
For example, this mud house's interior wall is shared with the exterior one, as both interior and exterior are one cohesive unit. There is no contrast in entrance and exit. Rather, when you walk into this mud house, you expect the inside to be mad of mud as well. In the earlier days, function was valued over pure aesthetic form until civilizations like the Greeks began to diverge from the ancient structural monotony.
Even though architecture began to diverge from simplisitic shapes and forms, there still remains no difference between the interior and exterior. The Parthenon was a marvel of marble, and it was completely immersed in marble through the entire structure. You don't walk through the Parthenon expecting the interior to be made of gold, though the statue of Athena certainly was made of gold.
Fast forward to modern times and we see a growing and distinct difference between Architecture and Interior Design. In fact, as we get technologies like air conditioning, there was an aesthetic and physical need to change the interior design to differentiate itself.
If we look at the exterior of this Japanese house, we see two distinct monolithic white blocks. However, we cannot extrapolate anything rationally about it's interior from the exterior. While the actual interior of this house demonstrates a stylistic consistency with the exterior, you could easily swap out this mellow wooden interior with mahogany woods and blue paint. Or the bedroom of a possible young female occupant may be painted pink. In today's world, there is no longer a clear line between interior architecture and exterior architecture. As stated, these two disciplines are now demarcated as Interior Design and Architecture. In certain cases, like the James B. Hunt Library, some parts of the exterior architecture are essential to the interior design and structure. This is an example of continuity between interior and exterior in modern architecture.
However, this rift between interior and exterior becomes prominent when you observe even larger buildings.
This hotel, the Godfrey Hotel in Chicago certainly take some of it's cues from the HSBC bank in Hong Kong, but when you consider the interior, it leaves everything purely to the imagination. Given this physical structure's constraints, supposedly it has to include rooms and amenities for the visitor. But in what style? The exterior of the building suggests to include perhaps something modern. However, it does not need to conform to that standard. If this was placed in Abu Dubai, then perhaps the interior could reflect Middle Eastern sensibilities or Western motifs. There is no distinct continuation between interior and exterior. To this regard, people in residential and public areas are now more focused on how decorative the interior is. Large chain stores like Lowes and Home Depot in the United States offer the DIY enthusiasts to furnish their homes.
This phenomena isn't a coincidence. It has worked in tandem with modernist simplicity. The design idiom of today could probably be to "increase the inside because we spend more time inside than outside". For example, our local YMCA can do away with interior renovations because the outside facade is nothing to admire. These interior renovations make more of a difference for members, and that's the desired result.
In fact, I believe that Interior design has almost supposed exterior design, such that a traditional importance scale has been shifted. As architecture become more simplistic, interior design will become the differentiating factor between buildings. The irony is that the futuristic architecture portrayed in science fiction media like Tron: Legacy seems to return to the fusion of interior an exterior architecture. Perhaps we may move in that direction.
