For architecture, sliding elements provide excellent opportunities to change buildings and room structures in a space-saving as well as a flexible way. However, this was not discovered as recently as in the last century but already many thousands of years before.
The best prove for this is the thousands of years old Japanese way of building. In the traditional houses one will not find any revolving doors at the entrance or between the separate rooms. The walls of the house consisted mainly of materials such as wood, bamboo and silk or paper for the interior. Light-weight sliding walls and doors were fixed to rigid and stable walls and thus could easily enlarge or minimize a room without requiring any space.
Nowadays, sliding doors and windows are predominantly applied where they otherwise would be exposed to high mechanical forces due to their size, e.g. as entrances for gateways, garages and halls. Lead on rails on the inner or outer wall they are easy to open, do not offer any broad surface to wind and can additionally be equipped with an electric engine.
The space-saving application of sliding elements has also proven in the production of furniture, e.g. in wardrobes with large sliding doors or also in beds where a second mattress can be stored in a space-saving way under on shifting or rolling devices under the bed. Even in the narrowest parking space opening a sliding door on the car is no problem. Thus you can see that modern sliding curtains are not an invention of modern architecture or interior design but have been re-discovered and technically perfected due their highly functional and decorative properties.