In the introduction to this beautifully designed and highly readable book, Alice Friedman asks: “Why were independent women clients such powerful catalysts for innovation in domestic projects?” (15). The most compelling answer she provides is that these clients’ goals were a close fit with the designers’ desire to completely rethink the home, “a redefinition of domesticity that was fundamentally spatial and physical” (16). Friedman outlines a variety of housing that women clients sought when turning...