Gilded together: luxury through the ages

Paradoxically, in the history of civilisations, it wasn’t an object at all that formed the foundation and concept of luxury, but rather something intangible: the collective appreciation for the extraordinary. The experience of striving within a tribe, community, group to searching for something above and beyond the mundane, to reach the sacred. Even in the Palaeolithic era (2.5 million years ago to 10,000 B.C.), when man could relax, after the trails and travails of securing sustenance sustainably, people could then engage in ceremonies, rituals, and sacred exchanges. Activities such as prayers, songs, and invocations symbolised something rare, otherworldly, and divine. These pursuits were spiritual and communal, in other words, experiential.

Rituals and ceremonies need accoutrements and accessories of course, and as early civilisations began acquiring wealth and building empires and kingdoms, luxury became associated with objects and material things. Interest in acquiring gold, jewelry, costumes, and palaces accelerated – as did the artistry and craft required to capture them – and so good was this ancient bling, that powerful and prosperous individuals knew they needed to take with them to the afterlife. The Pharaohs, with their grand tombs filled with possessions, embodied luxury hoarding — making a statement that the acquisition of luxury was both an earthly and eternal pursuit. Bringing your horses, pets, and ships to your grave was also a gesture about linking power and status between lives and leaving a legacy throughout each life; we still pass on jewels and watches today. This intertwining of material wealth and cultural beliefs underpins how luxury has often served as both a status symbol and a deep expression of human desire and nature — and even security in terms of a journey into the unknown.

By Hellenistic and Roman times, the luxury party was deemed to be out of control, and thinkers such as the Stoic philosophers criticised those members of their societies who pursuit such pleasures as betraying virtue. Corrupting decadence and moral laxity were consequences of pursuing luxury. Seneca asked and answered: “What is luxury? It is not the use of a thing, but its abuse that constitutes luxury.” This is also the period the concept and word luxuria developed, connected with the words “extravagance” or “excess” and their value judgement associations, which we still use today. For the Romans, luxuria symbolised rebellious indulgence and decadence, with focus on bodily pleasure. By the Middle Ages, we were all instructed to eschew earthly pleasures and suppress desire in favour of spiritual asceticism. Luxury objects and possessions existed for and should be deployed only for Royalty and the Church, displayed in ornate religious objects and lavish ceremonial attire. Everyone else was left with just the word “luxury” and its loaded meaning: Latin evolved into Norman French, and the term became luxury, carrying connotations of lust. By the time it entered the English language around 1340, the word included a sexual association.

In the Renaissance, luxury was again restored and accepted as a necessary part of living a fulfilled life. The concept was even favoured and celebrated as a statement on the beauty of life itself, which resulted in a proliferation of material beauty. Although this burst of creativity was expanded in artistry and craftsmanship, these objects of beauty were not an end in themselves – they were firmly tied to Humanist principles of celebrating the collective achievements of men, and this became a communal – again, experiential – pursuit.

In the advent of Modernity — as well as throughout the 20th Century, the spiritual and experiential elements of luxury were sidelined for wealth, aspiration, and time. These became defining forces, shaping luxury into an evolving pursuit of status, meaning, and cultural influence. "He had come to the conclusion that the only possible refuge was in the artificial,” wrote the French author Joris-Karl Huysmans in À Rebours, summing up the Decadent Movement’s appreciation of the man-made and artistic, rescuing this desire from an empty modern world.

On the one hand, luxury has always been a mirror of cultural and societal development, evolving in meaning, materiality, and significance. However, on the other hand, it seems like the expanding definition and shifting understanding of what luxury is creates a full circle that reverts to more ancient and historic ideas of it — those that refer to experience and collective enjoyment, something extraordinary, out of the self.