The Museum of Modern Architecture's newest exhibit examines the Bauhaus movement by showcasing a restored 1920s office space and _____...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

• The Museum of Modern Architecture's newest exhibit
  • examines the Bauhaus movement
    • by showcasing a restored 1920s office space
    • and [?] (Walter Gropius's) original furniture, lighting fixtures,
      • and architectural drawings.
• Visitors can observe
  • how form and function merged
    • in this influential design philosophy.

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start reading to understand what this is about:

The Museum of Modern Architecture's newest exhibit examines the Bauhaus movement...

• The exhibit is examining this design movement called Bauhaus
• It's doing this 'by showcasing a restored 1920s office space'
  • So they've restored an actual office from the 1920s to show what Bauhaus was about

Now the sentence continues with 'and' - they're showcasing the office space AND something else.

This is where we have the blank.

Let's look at the choices:

• A: it's designer's
• B: its designers
• C: its designer's
• D: it's designers

So we're deciding between:

• 'it's' vs 'its' - that's a contraction (it is) versus a possessive (belonging to it)
• 'designer's' vs 'designers' - that's singular possessive versus plural

To see what works here, let's read the rest of the sentence and understand what it's saying!

The blank is followed by '(Walter Gropius's) original furniture, lighting fixtures, and architectural drawings.'

Now let's really understand what this is telling us:

• The parenthetical '(Walter Gropius's)' is giving us a specific name
  • Walter Gropius was a famous Bauhaus architect
  • This tells us WHO the designer is
• 'Original furniture, lighting fixtures, and architectural drawings'
  • These are the actual items being showcased
  • They belong to this designer
• The word before the parenthetical should connect the office space to the designer

So the complete picture is:

• They're showcasing the office space AND the items that belonged to the person who designed that office space
• That person is Walter Gropius

What do we notice about the structure here?

• We need a word that shows possession - that the furniture/fixtures/drawings belong to someone
• That someone is 'the designer of the office space'
• So we have a chain of possession:
  • The office space has a designer
  • That designer has furniture/fixtures/drawings
• 'Its' (possessive) refers back to the office space
• 'Designer's' (singular possessive) shows that these items belong to that one designer
• This matches '(Walter Gropius's)' - one person, possessive form

The correct answer is Choice C: its designer's

This creates: 'its designer's original furniture' = 'the office space's designer's original furniture' = 'Walter Gropius's furniture'

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Possessive Pronouns and Possessive Chains

The key concepts here are:

1. 'Its' vs 'It's'

• 'Its' = possessive pronoun (belonging to it)
• 'It's' = contraction (it is)

Examples:

• The building lost its roof in the storm. (possessive - the roof belongs to the building)
• It's raining today. (contraction - It is raining today)

2. Possessive Chains (called 'double possessives' in grammar terms)

Sometimes you need to show that something belongs to someone, and that someone belongs to something else. You create a chain of possessive forms:

• The museum's director's office = the office of the director of the museum
• My friend's sister's car = the car of the sister of my friend
• Its designer's furniture = the furniture of the designer of it

In our sentence:

• 'its designer's original furniture'
• = the original furniture of the designer of the office space
• = Walter Gropius's original furniture

3. Singular Possessive vs Plural

• 'designer's' = singular possessive (one designer who possesses something)
• 'designers' = plural (multiple designers, not showing possession)
• 'designers'' = plural possessive (multiple designers who possess something)

The parenthetical '(Walter Gropius's)' confirms we need singular possessive to match this one person's name.