The Deutscher Werkbund, Stuttgart's Weißenhofsiedlung exhibition of 1927, and Adolf Loos

       To preface this entry, it is important to identify the central designers to be discussed.  The Deutscher Werkbund, or German Work Federation, was established in 1907 in München by Hermann Muthesius, a German architect best known for his three volume work "The English House"; an extensive study of the English Arts & Crafts movement.  It's purpose upon formation was to establish a connection between designers and product manufacturers to promote the success of German products in international markets.  It would come to define the direction of modern architecture and eventually transform into the German Bauhaus.  Adolf Loos is an Austrian architect born in 1870.  He detested the ideas of the Art Nouveau and was a vocal theorist of modern architecture.


  In 1927 the Deutscher Werkbund, under the creative direction of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, held an exhibition in Stuttgart meant to showcase the efficiency and viability of the modern style.  The Weißenhofsiedlung, as it was known in German, featured 17 architects; among them Walter Gropius, Peter Behrens, Le Corbusier, and Mies himself; and 21 residential buildings united by features such as simplified facades, flat roofs, and open plan interiors.  Among these 21 buildings is Mies' Weißenhof Apartments.

The rear entries of Mies' Weißenhof Apartments viewed from the rear facade streetfront.  

Occupants are directed though exterior courtyard spaces and into a central datum.  

Vertical circulation is extruded out away from the interior living space.

An axonometric drawing of the Weißenhof Apartments.  The spatial connection 

from exterior to interior through the courtyard spaces is illustrated.

Mies' simplified facade is illustrated in this plan drawing of the Weißenhof 

Apartments.  Simplifed facades such as this one are a trademark of the Weißenfhofsiedlung 

exhibition and the International Style that largely arose from it.

A plan drawing of a single unit in the Weißenhof Apartments.  Blue areas signify Mies' 

circulation plan. Red areas show the proportional rhythm that structures the open plan.

      Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's Weißenhof Apartments feature 5 equal divisions of space arranged laterally and contained within four simple planes.  The spaces are united by a central datum that runs through two living spaces to one side of a central stairway and one living space to the other.  Less public spaces, such as the kitchen, are drawn away from the center to the edge of the bounded space where it can serve its function away from visiting eyes.  Upon examination, the one area of the building that breaks the defined form of the rest of the design is used for vertical circulation.  From the outside the space holds a certain prominence as it extrudes out from the unifying facade of the apartment's living areas.  This move allows vertical circulation, while remaining prominent, to be pulled from the open plan, freeing the living space to exist in an uncluttered condition.

Adolf Loos' Steiner House features a simplified facade similar to those 

found in the Weißenfhofsiedlung exhibition's designs.

The interior of the Steiner House is shown in plan view.  Many of the same principles found 

in Mies' Weißenhof Apartments are at work here, however the plan is, overall, somewhat 

more complicated.

      Adolf Loos' Steiner house stands in contrast to Mies' Weißenfhof Apartments.  Loos was originally scheduled to be one of the architects featured in the Weißenhofsiedlung exhibition before tensions arose between Loos and the Werkbund over Loos' criticisms.  This difference in opinion is shown in the designs of Loos.  While the Steiner House features several features found in the Werkbund's work in Stuttgart, there are also several notable differences.  Like Mies, Loos' design pulled the house's kitchen away from prominence in the interior scheme.  The Steiner House also featured a highly simplified facade design.  Unlike Mies, Loos' design shifted vertical circulation into the interior of the space.  Circulation through living spaces is also pulled out to the spatial edges of the house, whereas Mies' circulation plan cuts straight through the living areas.  Also in contrast to Mies' ideas, the Steiner House's interior plan, while featuring a number of identical spaces in terms of size, pulls the important interior spaces to the four corners of the overall building envelope.

Sources:

http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Steiner_House.html

http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Weissenhof_Apartments.html

http://www.mimoa.eu/projects/Germany/Stuttgart/Weissenhofsiedlung

http://www.weissenhof.ckom.de/02_gebaeude/index1.php?kategorie=0&id=&flash=0

Horta, Guimard, van der Velde, and Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau, a relatively short-lived European Architecture movement near the dawn of the twentieth century, heralded the coming of a new age.  Inspired by natural forms and structures, it is universally characterized by its use of flowing, organic, curvilinear forms and connection to nature.  Art Nouveau, French for "new art" viewed the design of all things as a chance for artistic expression.  The movement was characterized by its ornate opulence and, as such, was restricted to the wealthy and could never move into the mainstream.

This staircase from Victor Horta's home demonstrates the ornate, organic forms of Art Nouveau.

The first recognized implementation of the Art Nouveau style in architecture is found in Belgian architect Victor Horta's Hôtel Tassel.  Hôtel Tassel, built in Brussels in 1894, broke the bounds of accepted architectural conventions of the day, featuring a groundbreaking open floor plan and prominently used, intricate iron-work.  He believed that his use of curvature in his iron work was not merely artistic expression, but also rather practical.  Horta continued to refine his definition of the style in his future work, resulting in Hôtel Tassel and three of his other townhouse designs being designated UNESCO World Heritage sites.

Victor Horta's Hôtel Tassel, the first example of architectural Art Nouveau.  

Its ornate facade did not seek to blend into the fabric of accepted architecture, 

but rather blazed a trail all its own.

Upon seeing Hôtel Tassel for himself, French architect Hector Guimard joined in the Art Nouveau movement.  Influenced by the rational writings of Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, Guimard sought the use of standardization and industrialization to efficiently utilize the new materials, glass and iron, that were available to him.  This is evidenced in few, if any, places more distinctly than in Guimard's designs for entrances to the Paris Metro.  Deeply committed to the ideals of harmony and continuity, Guimard took Art Nouveau into the design of interiors and furniture as a continuation of the overall design expression.  His use functional design in interiors is perhaps best noted in the Humbert-de-Romans concert hall where his frame design is said to produce "perfect acoustics."

This Paris Metro entrance demonstrates Guimard's use of standardization in 

Art Nouveau.  His belief in industrialization as a tool to design was a key 

component of evolving modernism.

Another prominent designer of the Art Nouveau movement was Belgian architect Henry van der Velde.  Van der Velde, originally a painter by trade, borrowed heavily from the Arts & Crafts movement upon his entrance to architecture.  Upon receiving recognition for his design work, van der Velde obtained several commissions in Berlin.  Popularized by German magazine Jugend, a publication devoted to spreading the image of the Jugendstil style (the German equivalent of Art Nouveau), Henry van der Velde made significant contributions to German architecture including participating in the Werkbund, an organization that promoted German design, and establishing the predecessor to the German Bauhaus.  Through these associations, he pushed the bounds of Art Nouveau into a new form of modernism.

The College of Arts and Crafts, designed by Henry van der Velde, 

was the predesessor to the German Bauhausschool and exhibits 

movement away from the flowing organic forms of earlier Art Nouveau 

for the clean lines of the German Jugendstil movement.

Art Nouveau, while historically short-lived, paved the way for the decades of modernism were to come.  The movement embraced the design of all elements as components of the overall design concept and inspired future architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright.  Art Nouveau, although primarily confined to Europe, sent out shockwaves that would be felt worldwide.

Semper v. Le-Duc

Gottfried Semper, a German architect and architectural theorist born in Mecklenburg in 1803, and Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, a French architect and theorist born in Paris in 1814, were in many respects similar men.  Both were influenced by the writings of 19th century English social theorist John Ruskin, who wrote of the "Seven Lamps" of Architecture (sacrifice, truth, power, beauty, life, memory and obedience). Both praised the ancient Greek classical style of architecture.  Both were distinctly influenced by their European surroundings and heritage as well as by their military service.  Where they diverged was, in many facets, on the fundamental level of form versus function.
Viollet-le-Duc fundamentally believed that architecture should emphasize and largely represent the expression of its own construction.  His work revolved around finding the most efficient, or ideal, structural forms of materials and then designing constructs comprised from them.  He praised Greek architecture for its expression of structure while embracing modern materials to form the classical ideas into his vision of something that he believed to be perfect.  Credited as one of the fathers of the modern movement of architecture, Viollet-le-Duc is largely known, and often criticized, for his imaginative restorations of medieval French buildings in which he attempted to form them into his vision of their "ideal" form using the new materials available to him, a form that in many cases differed greatly from their original form.  His design style was free from the aesthetic cues of his surroundings as he attempted to find an ideal form and not an accepted cultural style.  The aesthetics of a construct, he believed, must clearly and prominently display its structural form. He focused his modernist ideas mostly on the gothic style of architecture, a style that Gottfried Semper saw as a reflection of the religious and aristocratic hierarchies and not the social values and context that he would come to focus on.
Semper, on the other hand, believed that function was above all else in the structure of space.  Structure need not be the supreme focus of architecture.  Rather, he believed that structure could be consolidated at points and not throughout the entire wall.  His theories stated that the roof and load bearing elements formed one system separate, and yet largely integrated into, a non load-bearing building envelope in a similar fashion to modern curtain walls. In his mind, structure and other building systems existed independently but could be, and should be, melded together into one based around fundamental concepts such as proportionality to achieve the desired prime social functions that he believed lie at the center of architecture.  This reflects his belief that at the center of built space, contained within "platform", "enclosure" and "roof," was a fundamentally social environment, his concept of "hearth." He praised Greek architecture for the social ideas which were expressed within.  Unlike Viollet-le-Duc, Semper believed that building aesthetics must reflect the socio-political conditions of their setting and place in time.  Architecture was not an expression of something ideal, but rather of the culture itself.

Introduction

This blog is being written in conjunction with course material for Ball State University's ARCH 329: History of Architecture II.

My name is Josh and I'm a third year architecture student at Ball State University.  Prior to my transfer to Ball State University, I spent a year at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, GA.  In this blog I will be providing analytical commentary on a number of topics focusing architecture and architects in the modern era of architecture.