Bauhaus International Style: LECTURE 31

International Style

-functional and rational architecture. -machine aesthetics and modern materials -Bauhaus

Frankfurt Kitchen

-Grete Schutte-Lihotzky -1926 -Example of the impact of the design philosophy of Bauhaus. esp. its emphasis on functionalism and rationalism. -Created by professional female designer during the Weimar Republic, the help women homemakers. -Ancestor of all built-in modern kitchen designs -designed to improve hygiene and efficiency.

Weissenhof Siedlung row houses

-J.J.P. Oud -Stuttgart, Germany -1927 -Leading De Stijl architect from the Netherlands -Municipal Housing Architect of the city of Rotterdam -Cubicular row houses with a tower-like entrance area and ribbon windows -dell into disgrace during later years because of High Modernists because he was not enough of a purist for rational and functional architects (continued to use some ornaments)

Shell Headquarters

-J.J.P. Oud -The Hague -1938

Perspective Drawing for Domino House Project

-Le Corbusier -Marseilles -1914 -Swiss Architect, not part of the Bauhaus, but part of international style architecture. -Idea of a house reduced to its very minimum: reinforced concrete slabs with steel columns. -Architecture as an absolutist imperative to radically reform the life of everybody.

Unite d'Habitation

-Le Corbusier -Marseilles -1946 -Not one of the finest pieces of international style architecture, but a monument to its failure. -Le Corbusier thought of architecture as a tool to reshape and improve upon society (Utopia mission of architecture.) -attempt at urban rationalization -"renew" old urban city structures by cramming in as many people into centrally located, gigantic building units as possible. -contains apartment "cells" for 1,600 people. -mass of the building raised on concrete legs -notion of the ideal community -Postmodern criticism of the International Style: (De-humanizing, breeds crime, not community oriented, one size fits all, destroys particularities of local culture.) -does not announce Utopia but a nightmare instead.

Villa Savoye

-Le Corbusier -Poissy-sur-Seine -1929 -Luxury Architecture, one of Le Corbusier's most successful designs. -Steeped in Cubist-inspired machine aesthetic -Pristine white box raised on 26 delicate columns above a curving ground-floor wall. -Delicate play between opacity and transparency, closed form and open space. -structure exists by its very richness of shapes and inflections -ramps, cylinders of the roof, cork-screw stairs, elegant handrails -One of the finest examples of international style architecture.

Weissenhof Siedlung blocks of flats (Le Corbusier)

-Le Corbusier -Stuttgart, Germany -1927 -Leading Swiss International Style Architect, but not a member of the Bauhaus -Key Characteristics: main body of building raised above ground floor on supporting columns, horizontal ribbon windows, roof garden.

Model for a glass skyscraper

-Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe -Berlin -1922 -Architect associated with the Bauhaus -Invented (with Gropius) the International Style. (most important works realized in the U.S.) -International Style came to define the skylines of large American cities after 1945. -Van Der Rohe's architecture abandoned load-bearing walls; replaced by glass-curtain walls. -Here: early model for a skyscraper to be built in Germany -The materials are concrete, iron, glass... no noodles or armored turrets. A construction of girders that carry the weight, and walls that carry no weight.. buildings consisting of skin and bones.

Tugenhat House

-Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe -Brno (Czech Republic) -1930 -International style buildings have the reputation of not being suited for domestic architecture.. especially families. -This building proves the contrary: commisioned by the Tugenhat family who lived here happily until the annexation of today's Czech Republic by the Third Reich. -Variation on the Barcelona Pavillion's features: chromium-steel columns supporting a slab roof, polished slabs of marble (in addition to wooden pallisander panels) dividing the interior space, panoramic glass windows. -built on a hilly site over 2 stories -series of terraces giving access to the garden, which is an integral part of the design -subdued colors and natural hues define the interior.

Weissenhof Siedlung blocks of flats (Van der Rohe)

-Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe -Stuttgart, Germany -1927 -Weissenhof Siedlung (Siedlung= Settlement) is a model settlement built by 16 international style architects from across Europe under the aegis of the Deutscher Werkbund and the city of Stuttgart in 1927, on the occasion of an internationally noted exhibition of architecture. -Deutscher Werkbund (German Association of Craftsmen) was closely associated with the Bauhaus. -Mies' building was the tallest and largest on the site, 4 story block on the highest portion of the hill.

German Pavilion, International Exhibition

-Ludwig Mies van der Rohe -International Exhibition, Barcelona -1929 -One of the earliest structures actually built according to these ideas -Pavillion has no function except for self-display -Similar to a sculpture, raised on a marble base -No load-bearing walls; internal walls are hardly more than screens -thin slab of the roof floats on slender chrome-plated steel columns -transition between exterior and interior played down -building and environment (nature) seem to merge -reflecting pool. -building design had to be executed on short notice -expensive materials, especially marble

Shop Block, The Bauhaus

-Walter Gropius -Dessau -1925 -Bauhaus= Name of a very influential school of art and design founded in Germany after WWI -In 1925, the school moved to a new campus built in the town of Dessau -Innovative mission of school: Art and Tech should enter a symbiosis in the curriculum of the school. -Idea of functionalism in design, factory-like appearance. -One of the earliest examples of rationalism in architecture: function of building expressed in the exterior appearance of the design. -Here: facade built entirely out of modern materials like steel, concrete, and glass.

Walter Gropius House (Dessau)

-Walter Gropius -Dessau, Germany -1925 -Gropius, professor of architecture at the Bauhaus school of design, built this house in 1925, when the school moved from Weimar to Dessau -With its white cube, lack of architectural decorations, use of industrial materials, it is the epitome of functionalism, and specifically of the international style. -Gropius immigrated to the U.S. in 1937, had a great influence on post-war American architecture. -The interior of the home has chrome-plated steel tube furniture... hallmark of the Bauhaus.

Walter Gropius House (Lincoln)

-Walter Gropius -Lincoln, MA -1937 -Gropius became the director of the Graduate school of design at Harvard -Gropius's own house in MA looks like a pre-war Bauhaus or Le Corbusier design transplanted to New England.

Fagus Shoe Factory

-Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer -Alfred an der Leine (lower Saxony, Germany) -1911 -Gropius worked alongside Adolf Meyer on the design for the shoe factory in the small town of Alfred an der Leine. -Building became a precursor for many later international style structures. -Probably the most advanced building erected anywhere in Europe before WWI: walls reduced to a glass skin stretched between columns; corners of the building were made transparent... in an oblique way, Gropius realized Taut"s theoretical fantasies about glass prisms by incorporating these ideas into a functionalist structure.