Early Twentieth Century Architecture

Modernism in Harmony with Nature: Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959), American architect.

Studied engineering briefly at the University ofStudied engineering briefly at the University of Wisconsin, and worked for the firm of Dankmar Adler (1887–1900) and Louis Sullivan in Chicago before opening his own practice there in 1893.opening his own practice there in 1893.

His legacy is an architectural style that departed f i fl lfrom European influences to create a purely American form, one that included the idea that buildings can be in harmony with the natural environmentenvironment.

Shingle style

In the U.S., a style of wood-e U.S., a s y e o woodshingle-covered domestic architecture of the 1870-80s. It had a significant influence on Frank Lloyd Wright.

The Shingle style is characterized by a free-flowing,

McKim, Mead, and White, W. G. Low House, 1887, Bristol, Rhode Island, (Shingle Style)

characterized by a free flowing, open plan; open porches and irregular roof lines contribute to the picturesque or rustic effect. Style)p q

F k Ll d W i ht H & St diFrank Lloyd Wright Home & Studio, 951 Chicago Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois, 1889

Prairie School: A group of American architects practicing mainly in the Midwest whose designs for low, horizontally extended houses and g , yemphasis on natural materials were influenced especially by Frank Lloyd Wright.

Prairie houses were generally built of brick, wood, and plaster, with stucco walls and bands of casement windows.

The Prairie architects emphasized horizontal lines by using low roofs with wide projecting eavesroofs with wide, projecting eaves.

Their structures are characterized by light, i l d h hcrossing volumes and spaces; they reach out to

nature, not to other buildings.

F k Ll d W i ht R bi H Chi Illi i 1907 1909Frank Lloyd Wright, Robie House, Chicago, Illinois, 1907-1909.

Arranged in plan as two sliding horizontal

i dsections around one axis.

Frank Lloyd Wright, Robie House, plans, Chicago, 1907

It’s centered around fireplace.

The roofs are projecting out on steel beams and anchored at h d hthe center around the

chimneys.

Windows are long, symmetrical rows imbedded into the brick structure.

Outside and inside the house are flowing into each other.

Frank Lloyd Wright, Robie House, Chicago, Illinois, 1907-1909.

Robie House, interior details.

L ili f f i tiLow ceiling for sense of intimacy.

Frank Lloyd Wright. Dining-room set from Robie House

Arts and Crafts Movement: Dedicated to reestablishing theDedicated to reestablishing the importance of high-quality craftsmanship in an era of mechanization and mass production. p

Comparison: Charles RennieComparison: Charles Rennie Mackintosh, and Margaret

MacDonald (Scottish). Reconstruction of Ladies’ Luncheon Room, Ingramof Ladies Luncheon Room, Ingram

Street Tea Room, 1900–1912.

Robie House, window details.

New Simplicity: Vienna before WWI

Adolf Loos (1870-1933),

Austrian architect.

Educated in Dresden, Germany, he practiced in Vienna and spent extendedpracticed in Vienna, and spent extended periods in the U.S where he visited Chicago and encountered the writings of Sullivan – who advocated abandoning gornaments in architecture.

Opposed to both Art Nouveau and Beaux Arts historicismBeaux-Arts historicism.

His work strongly influenced European Modernist architects after World War I.

“When a tattooed man dies at liberty, it simply means he hasn’t had time to commit his crime”.

Adolf Loos, Steiner House, Vienna, Austria, 1910.

had time to commit his crime . From Ornament and Crime by

Adolf Loose

Adolf Loos, Steiner House, Vienna, Austria, 1910.

The main facade is a symmetrical balanced composition of rectangles.

Adolf Loos, Steiner House, Plan/Section/Side Facades, Austria, 1910.

Comparison: Joseph Maria Olbrich, Secession Building ,1898, Vienna, Austria (Austrian Art Nouveau)

Adolf Loos, Steiner House Vienna AustriaHouse, Vienna, Austria,

1910.

Gone is the symmetry of the Steiner Housethe Steiner House. 

The space on the inside has become the dominanthas become the dominant element of the composition.

Loos: Moller House, Vienna, 1930.

In this section, Loos has begun to manipulate the floor heights and to cantilever floor plates Rather thancantilever floor plates. Rather than being stacked, the floors are spatial units displaced horizontally across one another.one another.

Ad lf L L it di l ti th hAdolf Loos. Longitudinal section through the Moller Hose, Vienna. 

Tradition and Innovation in Germany

Peter BehrensPeter Behrens(1868-1940), German architect and designer.

Behrens is often seen as the first designer to project a modern face, or Corporate Identity for industry, designing buildings, products, showrooms, publicity material, and furniture for the German electrical manufacturer AEG from 1907 to 1914.

He was an influential pioneer of Modernism; Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe all worked in his office.

Industrial clock designed by Behrens for AEG, 1909

Peter Behrens, LogoPeter Behrens, Logo for AEG, 1907.

Peter Behrens, Fan, 1908, Painted cast iron and brass Manufactured by AEGiron and brass, Manufactured by AEG, Germany.

Peter Behrens, Hanging Light Fixture, AEG, Germany, 1920s

Peter Behrens, AEG Turbine Factory, 1909, Berlin, Germany

Peter Behrens, AEG Turbine Factory, 1909, Berlin, Germanyy, , , y

Modern Architecture Between the Wars

Piet Mondrian,Composition with Red Yellow andRed, Yellow and Blue1921Oil on canvas

De Stijl / The Style

A group of artists and architects in the Netherlands in the 1920s, including Mondrian and van Doesburg, who d t d th ti f f th t i ladvocated the creation of forms that were universal,

spaically unbounded, and attuned to modern technology.

Gerrit Rietveld. Chair1917 (N th l d )1917 (Netherlands) Wood (lacquered}. 66x83x88cm

Gerrit Rietveld(1888-1964), Dutch architect and furniture designerfurniture designer.

He was an apprentice in his father's cabinetmaking business and later studied architecture in Utrecht.

G it Ri t ld S h d H 1924 Ut htGerrit Rietveld, Schroder House, 1924, Utrecht, Netherlands

Created close relationship betweenCreated close relationship between the inside and outside.

Piet Mondrian,Composition with Red Yellow andRed, Yellow and Blue1921Oil on canvas

El Lissitzky Proun Space 1923 forEl Lissitzky, Proun Space, 1923, for Berlin exhibition

Gerrit Rietveld, Schroder House, 1924, Utrecht, Netherlands

Bauhaus (German for “House of Building”): 1919-33German school of art, design and architecture. It was founded by Walter Gropius with the ideal of integrating art, craftsmanship, and technology.

Realizing that mass production had to be the precondition of f l d i i th hi it b j t d thsuccessful design in the machine age, its members rejected the

Arts and Crafts Movement's emphasis on individually executed luxury objects.

Walter Gropius (1883-1969)

German-U.S. architect, designer and educator.

He studied in Munich and Berlin and inHe studied in Munich and Berlin and in 1919 became director of the Staatliches Bauhaus Weimar.

i fl d fIn 1934 Gropius fled Germany for Britain, and in 1937 he arrived in the U.S, taking a position at Harvard UniversityUniversity.

Gropius believed that all design should be approached through a systematic study of the

i l d d bl i l dparticular needs and problems involved, taking into account modern construction materials and techniques without reference to previous forms or stylesprevious forms or styles.

Walter Gropius and Adolph Meyer, Fagus Shoe Factory Alfed-an-der-Leine, Germany, 1911-25

Curtain Wall: Nonbearing wall of glass, metal, or masonry attached to a building's exterior structural frame.

This three-story factory uses a steel frame, allowing the facade to be made almost entirely of glass (“curtain wall”).

Walter GropiusWalter Gropius and Adolph Meyer, Fagus Factory,Alfed-an-der-Leine, ,Germany, 1911-16

Walter Gropius and Adolph Meyer, Fagus p p y , gFactory, Alfed-an-der-Leine, Germany, 1911-16

Peter Behrens, AEG Turbine ,Factory, 1909, Berlin, Germany

W lt G i d Ad l h MWalter Gropius and Adolph Meyer, Fagus Factory, Alfed-an-der-Leine, Germany, 1911-25

Walter Gropius, Shop Block, the Bauhaus, Dessau, Germany, 1925-1926

With its dynamic International Style composition, asymmetrical plan, smooth hit ll t ith h i t l i d d fl t f th b ildi bwhite walls set with horizontal windows, and flat roof, the building became a

monument of the Modernist movement.

• projected steel skeleton, which pulled the functionwhich pulled the function of support to the inside

Mechanically opened windows

Ceiling with light fixtures for stage

Bauhaus-Dessau

Atelier

Walter Gropius, Atelier, the Bauhaus, Dessau, Germany, 1925-1926

Gerrit Rietveld, Schroder House, 1924, Utrecht, Netherlands

Joseph Paxton, Crystal Palace, London, 1850

Charles Garnier, The Opera House, Paris.

1861-74

Le Corbusier (Charles-EdouardJeanneret-Gris) (1887-1965) Swiss-Jeanneret-Gris) (1887-1965), Swiss-born French architect and city planner.

His visionary books, startling white houses and urban plans (that included skyscraper cities and mass-produced housing) set him at the head of the modern movement in the 1920s,

Le Corbusier, The Modular

The Modulor is a scale of proportions p pdevised by Le Corbusier. He used the golden ratio and Fibonacci sequence

in his Modular system for the scale of

Leonardo Da Vinci, Vitruvian Man, 1492

architectural proportion.

Le Corbusier. Perspective d i f D i Hdrawing for Domino House project, Marseilles, France, 1914-15

A basic building prototype to be massed produced using inexpensive, standardized materials, with free-standing pillars and rigid floors. The structure g p gcan be repeated indefinitely either vertically or horizontally.

Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye at Poissy, France (1929–30).

• Structure raised on slender concrete pillars

• Open floor plan

• Long strip windows-ribbon windows

Roof terrace/garden• Roof terrace/garden

•Integral garage

Villa Savoye, details, France 1929–30.

Le Corbusier's. 'Plan Voisin de Paris‘ (Presented at the International Exposition in Paris, 1925)

The International StyleArchitectural style that developed in Europe and the U.S. in the 1920s and '30s and dominated Western

hit t i th id 20th tarchitecture in the mid 20th century.

The style's most common characteristics:

• Geometric, usually rectilinear forms

• Clean lines

• Open interior spaces

• Large expanses of glass, steel, and reinforced-concrete construction

Walter Gropi s L d ig Mies an der Rohe and Le

concrete construction

• Light, plane surfaces devoid of applied ornamentation

Walter Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and Le Corbusier are among the architects most clearly associated with the style.

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe(1886-1969), German architect and ( ),designer.

Mies learned masonry from his father and later worked in the office of Peterand later worked in the office of Peter Behrens.

di f h h i Mies van der Rohe, The Barcelona chair.He was director of the Bauhaus in 1930–33, first in Dessau and during its final months, in Berlin. After moving to the U S in 1937 he became director of theU.S. in 1937, he became director of the School of Architecture at Chicago's Armour Institute.

His buildings, steel skeletons sheathed in glass curtain-wall facades, exemplify Mies's edict that “less is more.”He had a great impact on the skyline of American cities.

The German Pavilion, built 1928-1929 for the Barcelona International Exposition, demolished 1930, Rebuilt in 1959 to the original design.

Mies van der Rohe, German Pavilion,model and plan 1929model and plan. 1929

Mies van der Rohe, German Pavilion, 1929

His Pavilion for the 1929 International Exposition in Barcelona, Spain, a

1929

p , p ,travertine platform with chromed steel columns and spaces defined by planes of extravagant onyx, marble, and frosted glass.

Mies van der Rohe, German Pavilion, 1929

Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye at Poissy, France 1929–30.

Mies van der Rohe, G /B l P ili 1929

Gerrit Rietveld, Schroder House, 1924 Utrecht NetherlandsGerman/Barcelona Pavilion, 1929 1924, Utrecht, Netherlands

In 1921 and 1922 Mies completedIn 1921 and 1922 Mies completed two designs for skyscrapers that never were built (the first completely glazed office building was not built g guntil 1950).

One triangular in plan the second a free-form plan of wavy curvesfree-form plan of wavy curves.

Mies van der Rohe - Maquette Glass Skyscraper (never built), 1922

Continuously curving glass curtain wallwall.

Art Deco (1920s and 1930s): International decorative movement whichInternational, decorative movement, which emphasized:

• Absolute bilateral symmetry in composition

• Use of angular shapes - influenced by Art Nouveau, Bauhaus, Cubist, Native , , ,American, and Egyptian sources

• A sleek and anti-traditional elegance that symbolized wealth and sophisticationsymbolized wealth and sophistication.

• Distinguishing features: simple, clean shapes, with a “streamlined” look; ornament th t i t i t li d f

Marlin Hotel - Art Deco architecture on Collins Ave. - Miami Beach, FL

that is geometric or stylized from representational forms.

• Typical motifs included stylized animals, foliage, nude female figures, and sun rays.

Office building (1928–30) in New York City designed by William Van Alen (1883–1954), des g ed by W a Va e ( 883 95 ),Beaux-Arts trained architect.. Its futuristic automotive ornamentation was specified by its owner, Walter P. Chrysler.

William Van Alen, Chrysler Building, New York City, New York, 1928-1930. Spire of stainless steel, overall height 1,048‘, Art Deco

Sculptures modeled after Chrysler automobile radiator caps decorate the lower setbacks, along with ornaments of car wheels.

Chrysler Building, interior details.

Reinhard & Hofmeister with HW Corbett & Raymond HoodReinhard & Hofmeister with HW Corbett & Raymond Hood,

Rockefeller Center, New York City, 1927-35, art Deco

Lee Lawrie, Wisdom - Reliefl b h isculpture above the main

entrance to the GE Building, Rockefeller Center, NYC, 1932

45 Rockefeller Plaza (Rockefeller Center): wall decoration above door (art deco)

The building is stripped off i d i hornamentation and it has a

strong sense of upward movement and verticality. The building is a simple slab withbuilding is a simple slab with white brick vertical piers alternating with red and black brick patterned spandrelsbrick patterned spandrels. Thus the appearance of windows is minimized.

Raymond Hood and John Mead Howells, Daily News Building; 42nd Street betweenDaily News Building; 42nd Street between Second and Third Avenues, New York, 1929-31

Daily News Building, Art Deco entrance and the ornate bas relief over the entrance

Daily News Building, Art Deco entrance and the ornate bas relief over the entrancethe ornate bas relief over the entrance

William Van Alen, Chrysler Building, y ginterior details, 1928.

Compare

Victor Horta, Tassel House, interior detail, 1893, Belgian

L W k f F k Ll dLater Works of Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright, Fallingwater, 1935, Mill g , ,

Run, PA

Fallingwater was voted the best building in g gthe U.S. in 1991 by members of the American institute for Architects.

Wright Kaufmann HouseWright, Kaufmann House(Fallingwater), Bear Run, Pennsylvania, 1936-1939.

Kaufmann House (Fallingwater), Bear Run, Pennsylvania, 1936-1939.

Fallingwater (Kaufmann House): living room

Fallingwater details

FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1943-1959.

79

80FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (exterior view from the northwest), New York, 1943–1959 (photo 1962).

FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Interior. New

York, 1943–1959

YouTube Play projection on the Guggenheim Museum. 2010

C i G QiCai Guo-QiangInopportune: Stage One, 2004

Nine cars and sequenced multichannel light tubeslight tubes

Later Works by Mies van der Rohe

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe860 – 880 N. Lake Shore Drive (1949-1951), Chicago

“Less is more.”-Mies van der Rohe

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip J h S B ildi NY 1954 8Johnson. Seagram Building., NY, 1954-8