Tracing the development of functionalism from Victorian times, Marcus establishes its basis as socially beneficial and without allegiance to stule, material or context. All that changed as the definition of functionalism narrowed and became closely identified with metal furniture, industrial materials, and austerity in the 1930s and was subsequently redefined simply as a modernist style. With the advent of postmodernism, functionalism has been overshadowed, but its classic designs - the metal furniture of Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, and Marcel Breuer - are now becoming broadly accessible, fulfilling social goals promoted over a century ago