Art Deco was a decorative arts and architecture movement that originated in the 1910s in Europe and migrated to America during the 1920s and 1930s (Wolf, 2014) . With the Wall Street Crash in October 1929 a major divide occurred between the 1920s and 1930s in America, which dramatically affected the mood of the two decades and the American modernist designs produced in each (Ryan, 2014) . A mix of two styles characterized the 1920s in America. The exotic materials and luxurious interiors found in skyscrapers and the functional geometry of ZigZag Moderne, which was influenced by artistic movements such as Dutch de stijl, French Cubism, Italian Futurism, Russian Constructivism and German Bauhaus. Both styles conceived the style that characterized the 1930s, in which elegant finishes, streamlined shapes, synthetic materials and an infatuation with speed and futuristic aspects were prominent, giving rise to Streamline Moderne (Ryan, 2014). Examples of how this decorative arts and architectural movement migrated from Europe to America can be noted in design and architecture such as the Chrysler Airflow (figure 1) and the Chrysler Building (figure 2) as well as the French ocean liner, the SS Normandie (figure 3), and the Puerto Rican Normandie Hotel (figure 4) of the same name. Art Deco derives from a variety of avant-garde influences including Art Nouveau, Bauhaus and Cubism (Fullerton Heritage, 2014). While the functionalist aspects of Art Nouveau developed into modernism, the more decorative, extravagant and stylistic aspects developed into what we know as Art Deco. Influences came from Indian, Egyptian, Mayan, and Aztec cultures (Wolf, 2014). The style symbolized complicated modernism designed for a new era in which design... middle of paper......embraced forward-thinking modernism and the machine age while indulging in the most flamboyant and exquisite of styles that might everything was accepted and the flashier it was, the better. The ZigZag Moderne style was mainly used for large public commercial buildings such as hotels, cinemas, restaurants, skyscrapers and department stores; where meetings could take place and people socialised, although a small amount of housing was also designed in the ZigZag Moderne style. ZigZag Moderne required expensive and exotic, artistically designed materials; it was largely a system of ornamentation applied to the smooth surfaces of buildings. Facade decoration was often completed with a luxurious array of materials including exotic wood veneers, marble, painted terracotta and metals (Fullerton Heritage, 2014).