Resorts at Sea: April

Before I officially started this project, I wrote about renderings vs. reality. I've always liked comparing these initial sketches to the finished product. How close does the vision match up? Sometimes, however, they never get off the drawing board.

By chance, I found a copy of Norman Bel Geddes' Horizons online. One of the Bibles of Industrial Design, it was very difficult to keep myself from doing a happy dance in the local library. (Trivia: He was the father of Barbara Bel Geddes, who appeared as the brassiere-designing love interest of James Stewart -- before Kim Novak came on the scene -- in Hitchcock's Vertigo. But she's more famously known as Miss Ellie, J.R. Ewing's mother on Dallas.)

The 1930s was the decade of streamlining. While the after decks opened up, there is 

precious little open space; everything hermetically sealed. A variation of this design 

was used in the movie The Big Broadcast of 1938, which introduced filmgoers to Bob Hope.

I had always planned on doing a section of proposals, of plans fated never to be. Among these, while not official plans, were concepts drawn up by Morris Lapidus that need to be seen to be believed. While I'm waiting on a new biography on Lapidus to come in, another source states he destroyed the bulk of his papers, so this article from Marine Engineering may be the only record of this kind of work.

 Above: Starlight and Sun Lounge.

Below: Cafe and Game Room.  

While such vast open spaces were impressive, I'm sure they're detrimental to any ship's safety should fire break out.

Regarding ships that did get built, a notation I found in an online biography of Donald Deskey states Charles Eames worked with him on the Argentina during her post-World War II renovation. I've not seen this anywhere else, but I've identified one article, which is perhaps the definitive description of her refit. Hopefully, when it comes into my possession, this will clear matters up.