Neues Bauen Research Articles

Review of Aleksander Laslo’s Research on Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Architecture in Zagreb

Architect Aleksander Saša Laslo (Celje, 1950 – Zagreb, 2014) was one of the leading historians of Croatian twentieth-century architecture, with a research scope centered on the city of Zagreb. Its aim was to investigate the processes of modernisation, tracing the evolution from high historicism and eclecticism through Art Nouveau to proto-functionalism and New Building (Ger. Neues Bauen, Cro. novo građenje) – viewed through building spatial-organisation, construction, and then inevitably form. Laslo’s interest, of course, extended beyond the mere physical structure of the building to wider social, economic, and cultural context, and dynamic knowledge exchange with Central Europe during that time, within which Laslo positioned the architecture of Zagreb. Methodologically, since the very beginning in the early 1980s, Laslo relied on exhaustive research, cataloguing, and contemporary research of Central European architecture. To mark the tenth anniversary of the death of this prominent researcher of Zagreb’s architectural heritage, this paper provides the first review of Laslo’s work, highlighting its comprehensiveness, integrity, and scientific method.

Housing for the Elderly

The banking family Emma and Henry Budge established their foundation in Frankfurt, Germany, as a civic initiative, aiming to build a contemporary, modern residential home for the elderly. Under the direction of Ernst May, appointed as city architect in 1925, the City of Frankfurt announced a unique competition in 1928 as part of its program Das neue Frankfurt: A retirement home for Jewish and Christian residents, primarily for people of the “educated middle class”. Architects Mart Stam, Werner Moser, and Ferdinand Kramer, members of the planning team Das neue Franfurt, won this competition with their innovative contribution. From 1928 to 1930, they realized a type of housing for the elderly that was exemplary for its time and for later retirement homes.Via Mart Stam, this project flowed into the teaching of the Bauhaus construction department in 1928-1929. On behalf of Mart Stam, Ella Bergmann-Michel produced the famous documentary film about the home Where do Old People Live? in 1930-1931.Special quality features of the two-story housing complex with 100 apartments were the interesting typology, the very consistent architectural language, colorfully designed, light-flooded rooms aligned along large common garden courtyards, and common areas as a social and architectural center. Equally remarkable were the iron skeleton construction in the central wing, the bulkhead construction method using prefabricated elements as partition walls between the rooms, and the cost and construction time savings due to the rational construction technology.Under the growing influence of the National Socialists and after the expulsion of Ernst May and his Frankfurt team, the denunciation of the social commitment and a propagandistic denigration of NEUES BAUEN, designing Modern Movement architecture, took place in an infamous way. At the same time, the National Socialists showed the buildings to foreign visitors as their achievement.After the destruction during the war, the building was used as a hospital for the U.S. Army.A very exemplary renovation of the ensemble was carried out in 2001-2002, planned by Dirk Hoppe Architects from Darmstadt, Germany, with the participation of the State Office for the Preservation of Historical Monuments, Dr. Christoph Mohr, the expertise and advice in preserving historical monuments of Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Ruggero Tropeano, Zurich. With minor changes in detail, for example, in the building services and the accessible design of the rooms, the continuity of use as a high-quality retirement home was restored, and this valuable example of modernist architecture was secured. An example of BEST PRACTICE.

Architetture per la cultura. Ridefinire la montagna contemporanea

Alpine architecture for culture seems to best represent the evolution over time of the very concept of alpine architecture. By their actual nature, these buildings are configured not only as meeting spaces for the inhabitants but also – and above all – as means of attraction for visitors from the cities, towards which these objects seem to assume the role of real business cards. Thanks to the diffusion of virtuous reference models of contemporary architecture from all over the Alps, operated starting from 1992 by the Neues Bauen in den Alpen / Alpine Contemporary Architecture award, in recent decades Alpine architecture has begun to become an increasingly debated topic. Alpine architecture for culture, therefore, seems to play a particularly significant role in the construction of a new image on the contemporary Alps, and the buildings dedicated to its diffusion seem to succeed especially when they abandon the tourist imaginaries on the traditional and the typical Alpine, often distorted and stereotyped, to embrace a vision that undertakes a reinterpretation of local historical elements in the current context. Proposing cultural alpine buildings which look towards contemporaneity can therefore represent a great contribution in the diffusion of the mountain as a container of current events, as well as heritage and tradition. For these reasons, cultural architectures located in the mountains should also look to the present in their forms. Within this issue, are presented three architectures located in France, and three Italian projects, which are located in Priero, in Piedmont, and Estoul and Bard in the Aosta Valley.

New color trends of the model Werkbund estates and Neues Bauen residential architecture during the Weimar Republic in Germany

New color trends of the model Werkbund estates and Neues Bauen residential architecture during the Weimar Republic in Germany

Lo verde como sistema: espacios verdes y vida al aire libre en la Holanda de entreguerras a través de las páginas de la publicación neerlandesa de 8 en Opbouw

Dutch Magazine de 8 en Opbouw, heir of i10 was from its beginnings in 1932, to its disappearance in 1943 for political reasons, one of the last refuge for the Neues Bauen. It was formed by two previous groups from Amsterdam and Rotterdam, de 8 and OPBOUW. The magazine was always vigilant of every experience coming from France, Germany, the URSS or the USA. They took on enthusiastically new theories about Lebensreform, and the necessity for redesigning the Nineteenth Century city. This work seeks for articles focused or related in some way to green areas or “Outdoor life” encouragement. We’ll discover how dramatic was their claim for public policies in hygienic improvements and new green areas necessity. We’ll also discover, specially from 1938, high urban and landscaping value projects, inspired from the german 20’s and the New Objectivity experiences, as the Amsterdam Bosch, Rotterdam Green Plan or several sports, bath and swimming complex or new schools.

African Housing Renaissance: The Case of Gacuriro Valley Satellite Settlements, Kigali, Rwanda

This article traces an African Housing Renaissance through the Trabantenstadt (Satellite City) vision for Kigali embedded in the Gacuriro Valley Satellite, which is composed of two settlements (or umudugudu, in Kinyarwanda): Kigali 2020 (2001–2005) and Kigali Vision (2013–2016). While the Kigali 2020 is an integrated Trabant (Satellite) which is able to interact with the existing context and trace the future built and unbuilt developments, the Kigali Vision adopts the idea of a protected compound, morphologically connected with the older settlements, but unable to tackle and solve spatial and social issues due to its ‘defensive’ character. The particular topography of the hillside receives an ambivalent interpretation: in the first umudugudu, the slope inspires the whole project, an organic raumplan, and in the second it has been denied, having been leveled for flat houses’ foundations and consequently a flat spatial indoor distribution. Nevertheless, this article argues that despite the evident architectural differences between the two settlements, they remain in the tradition of the Neues Bauen, in which mass housing represents the physical way of accommodating different social classes, granting equal and favorable living conditions. The typological variety demonstrates the aim to inclusively target distinct segments of the population. Apartment buildings (condominiums), row houses, twin houses and single houses mixed with public facilities, schools, a church, and sports structures, make up the settlements as unique pieces of a system and, at the same time, a singular whole.

Wilhelm Riphahn in Cologne (1913–1963): Urban Policies and Social Housing between Innovation and Conservation

An urbanist actively involved in social housing, a prolific designer and a rigorous developer, Wilhelm Riphahn (1889–1963) fulfilled the controversial role of ‘modern architect’. An intellectual and professional who can be included among the most interesting—yet least studied—members of the German Neues Bauen, he was one of the protagonists of the exemplary neighbourhoods of Dammerstock (1929) in Karlsruhe. He designed several neighbourhoods on behalf of Gemeinnützige Wohnungsbau AG Köln. In the 1920s, his pragmatic and operative attitude enabled him to initiate a functional and aesthetic revolution in the conservative world of affordable construction, the outcomes of which went well beyond the period after World War II. From 1918 to 1938, Riphahn brought to completion social neighbourhoods that had a remarkable urban impact in the troubled political context of the Rhineland between the two wars. His tireless energy led to a profusion of work in the infrastructural reconstruction of the battered city of Cologne up to the years of the German economic boom. Riphahn left significant and vibrant construction projects, such as the Britisches Kulturinstitut (1950), the fine urban complex of the Kölner Oper (1954–1957) and the Schauspielhaus (1962). The article focuses on the Siedlungen of Cologne and compares their original compositional features and exemplary character, which continue to have an impact within the context of social housing.

Contested Architecture: The ‘Woba’ Residential Colony in Basel, 1930

In 1930, a housing exhibition called ‘Woba’ took place in the city of Basel. Unique for Switzerland, the commercial aspect of the furniture industry was complemented by a newly constructed residential colony. In accordance with discussions held one year before at the II CIAM congress in Frankfurt a. M., the Wohnung für das Existenzminimum was brought to life. Thirteen architectural offices experimented with different spatial designs in order to develop cheap and hygienic housing for the working class. For one month, some of the houses were open to the public. In the Swiss press, a vivid and controversial debate arose. On one side, its supporters advocated for standardized and rationalized housing as an appropriate way of living for modern individuals. On the other side, conservative forces saw a communist scheme at work in this housing in the style of Neues Bauen. By analyzing contemporary press articles on the Woba, this paper shows that the question of society’s future was being negotiated through architecture and furniture.

Krössinsee (zachodniopomorski Złocieniec-Budowo) i inne narodowosocjalistyczne „zamki zakonne”. Budowa – funkcja – kostium stylowy

In 1934, construction began on training centers for the upper echelons of future NS leadership: the Vogelsang in the Eifel, Krössinsee (Polish Złocieniec-Budowo) in western Pomerania, and Sonthofen in Allgäu. Through the enormous efforts of the German Labor Front (DAF) the training centres, called Ordensburgen (literally: ‘castles of the orders’), were completed in 1936. In the meantime, much literature has been published on all of the NS Ordenburgen, yet an investigation of the genesis and analysis of their form is still lacking, which this essay partially attempts to address.
 The intention was undoubtedly to build Ordensburgen on the southern, western and eastern fringes of the Reich distanced less than 60 kilometres from the border. Rosenberg, who had made a statement to this effect in a speech in 1934, coined the name ‘Ordensburg’ in connection with the Teutonic Order – the proud champion of ‘Germanness’. The name evoked other echoes from history: young men who were trained for warfare and administration and who lived a life closed of from outside influences. The name also recalled the medieval orders of knights who exercised their power as a military authority along the frontiers of Christianity from Spain to Palestine.
 If we go beyond a formal interpretation of the Ordensburgen, what can be seen in all the three structures is the important symbolic function of towers (two rectangular brick towers were erected in Kroessinsee in 1939). In all of them so-called Tingplätze were built, a kind of open-air theatre for political rallies. Moreover, the architect Clemens Klotz embraced the modern age. In adhering to contemporary thought, he blended the cosiness of the Heimatstil with the monumentality and pathos of Neoclassicism. Other forms are also found, such as oval risalites derived from ‘Neues Bauen’ or the protruding window reveal, or the use of unworked stone blocks, something that was particularly characteristic of NS architecture. Yet despite the name ’Ordensburg’, formal references to medieval architecture are sparse. The most apparent examples are seen in the Sonthofen architecture of Herman Giesler in the proportions of the main tower or the vaulted ceilings of the tavern (the so-called Fuchsbau).
 After 1945, the Ordensburgen became the military barracks of the victors: Vogelsang was British until 1950, then Belgian; Sonthofen was American until 1956 and then turned over to the German Bundeswehr; Krössinsee was used by the Soviet army from 1947 or 1948, and afterward became the Polish Budowo. Vogelsang was opened to the public in 2006. Today, we face ongoing questions about the preservation and new uses of the Ordensburg structures and facilities. The designation of the former NS training centres as memorial sites, in which the juncture between Ordensburgen and the NS crimes finds physical expression, will presumably be the sole way to ensure their continued existence. Between 1939 and 1940, approximately 260 Ordensjunkers (the name derived from ‘Junker’: a nobleman from the landed class) were sent from Krössinsee on military assignment to the area of Poznań (‘Warthegau’), from where up to a half a million Poles and Jews were expelled to the Government General. Further documentation shows the involvement of the Ordensjunkers in the Holocaust during 1941 in the occupied Soviet territories. In making the buildings of the Ordensburgen accessible to the public, while at the same time laying bare the reality behind the mystique, it seems necessary to proceed on a different path than that which has been taken up to now. ‘Domesticating’ the testimonies of a terror regime has been expressed in ways such as the oversized colourful pillows for visitor seating at the Wewelsburg Castle or the garish plastic forms in Vogelsang. Tus, in addition to taking stock of the buildings and making a case for their preservation, the serious question that must be asked is how to deal with this kind of legacy.
 (translated by Sharon Nemeth)

Architectural practice and theory: the case of Bruno Taut's house in Berlin-Dahlewitz

<p>In 1926 Bruno Taut built his own house in Berlin-Dahlewitz. The German architect had already declared his ideas of housing in the book Die neue Whonung (1924) exemplifying the new concept of modern living-style, according to Neues Bauen. In other theoretical writings he defines the Neues Bauen in relation with new needs, tendencies and aesthetics of architecture, referring to important issues as climate, topography and tradition. The book Ein Whonhaus (1927) stigmatizes the coeval construction process of his house: the thirteen chapters are a detailed analysis which give evidence to every technological and morphological choice. Taut focuses on the relationship between architecture and landscape, type of furniture, functional plan layout, use of glass; especially he enlightens the reader as to the use of colour as a construction material. The house has an unconventional shape, it is a quarter of a circle; in his writings the architect painstakingly explains the impressive plan. With the book Ein Whonhaus Taut delivers to memory his home design, transforming process and ideas related to the modern house. He breaks through conventions and changes the notions of what Modernism could produce. The paper highlights the theoretical production related to the architect’s own house as praxis for doing architecture, emphasizing Taut’s contribution to a dialectic mutual relationship between theoretical and architectural practice, in order to achieve a more conscious and effective design process.</p>

Residential Buildings of Neues Bauen in Zagreb between 1928 and 1934

Ovaj je članak prerada autorove disertacije „Stambene kuće Novog građenja u sjevernim dijelovima Zagreba u razdoblju od 1928. do 1945. godine”, obranjene 12. travnja 2007. godine na Arhitektonskom fakultetu u Zagrebu, pod mentorstvom professora emeritusa Nikole Filipovića. A 39 ugrađenih najam nih stambenih zgrada i 109 vila Novoga građenja, podignutih između 1928. i 1935. godine, pokazuju snažan doprinos zagrebačkih arhitekata modernome pokretu.

‘Neues Bauen in Afrika’: displaying East and West German architecture during the Cold War

The transfer of knowledge about urban planning and architecture from the socialist East and the capitalist West to the post-colonial South was in the case of Germany not only a matter of built projects or experts. Important vectors for the migration of architectural and urban knowledge were public exhibitions. This paper focuses on the 1966 exhibition ‘Neues bauen in Afrika: Ausstellung der heutigen afrikanischen Architektur’ by the critic and historian Udo Kultermann in the Kongreshalle in Berlin, as well as on the ‘German Mobile Exhibition’ that travelled 24,000 km throughout Africa between 1961 and 1963 and in which German architecture and housing played an important role. The first exhibition was commissioned by the Deutsche Afrika-Gesellschaft, a state-sponsored association that was initiated ‘to clarify what may be expected in Germany of various territories in Africa and what we can do for its development’, while the second was a joint initiative of the ministries of Foreign Affairs and Development Aid that was considered as ‘a countermeasure to the strong presence of the Eastern Bloc in the African region’. Indeed, both exhibitions were reactions to the architectural and urban policy of the DDR in Africa, which was presented to a broad public in the 1969 nationwide exhibition ‘Architektur und Bildende Kunst. Austellung zum 20. Jahrestag der DDR’ and defined in its turn as a weapon against imperialism and as assistance to the birth of post-colonial nations. The paper argues that in 1960s' Germany exhibitions on architecture and urban planning in Africa were not only important vectors for the transfer of knowledge, but also the sites of a harsh symbolic battle between East and West that articulated a view of modern architecture as simultaneously oppressive and emancipatory.

‘Farmers on notice’: the threat faced by Weimar Berlin's garden colonies in the face of the city'sNeues Bauenhousing programme

ABSTRACT:TheNeues Bauenprogramme of urban development in Weimar Germany is best known amongst English-speaking historians for its modern housing estates, including those built by Bruno Taut in Berlin. Less well known are the negative impacts of this programme, particularly the displacement of thousands of garden colonies from the outskirts of towns and cities, which were cleared to make way for new developments. This article focuses on the historical development of the garden colonies in Berlin, and the threat they faced from urban expansion during the Weimar era.

Hard Roads to Unfamiliar Places

AbstractThe Weimar Republic's architecture avant‐garde also fell victim to the German Nazi regime. The movement's leading representatives were driven into exile. These circumstances shaped the transformation of the “Neues Bauen”, even after 1945

The Italian Hope: Rationalist Architecture’s Role and Reception in Germany

Examining the relation between architecture and power in the age of totalitarianism, Germer provides a new interpretation of the Modernism of around 1930: Modern Fascist architecture in Italy, itself influenced by the German Neues Bauen, became a model for the nationalist avant-garde of the Third Reich. The conservative elite supported a constrained architectural modernity, and rejected the critique of modernist architecture as Bolshevist by pointing to modernist Fascist architecture in Italy. The advocates of Neues Bauen stressed its “revolutionary character” in an attempt to persuade the National Socialists to adopt Modernism as an official style. While opening new vistas into German-Italian cultural relations, this article illuminates the challenge to modernist architecture after 1933.

Tuberculosis and the modern ideal of living

Sunlight and fresh air belong to the everyday life's myths. It has influenced our times and personal lives as much as industrialization. Today we are hardly aware of the multiple and omnipresent consequences of this myth. The modern movement with all its facets including modern architecture is barely conceivable without it. What is the link between this triad with all its effects and tuberculosis, the oldest and most important infectious disease which still claims more than 3 million deaths per year worldwide? Tuberculosis was treated by sunlight and fresh air at all times. This treatment was at its zenith during the second half of the 19th century after Hermann Brehmer had initiated this treatment within sanatoria in 1862. The sanatorium vogue lasted until the middle of the last century when streptomycin was isolated by Selman Waksman 1943. A new type of hospital was necessary for treating the patients with sunlight and fresh air: the sanatorium with its wide windows, sheltered open balconies, terraces and "Liegehallen". In return, this airy type of building was the forrunner of a new architectural style, called "Neues Bauen". The latter has profoundly influenced our modern ideal of living since Le Corbusiier built the Villa Savoye, one of the architectural highlights of the 20th century.

KS Neues ‐ Neues Bauen in Kalksandstein

BautechnikVolume 78, Issue 12 p. 911-911 Nachrichten KS Neues - Neues Bauen in Kalksandstein First published: 28 March 2013 https://doi.org/10.1002/bate.200106260Citations: 1AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article.Citing Literature Volume78, Issue12December 2001Pages 911-911 RelatedInformation

Wohnungsbau in der ehemaligen DDR

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size For the eastern part of Germany, the historical background and the planners' ideologies will be disclosed within the period between the End of the Second World War and the collapse of the former German Democratic Republic in 1989. The following phases will be mentioned: orientation by the ideas of the «Neues Bauen», the «Stalinization», change to typifying and industrialization in housing and—as a last phase—the reconstruction of historical buildings in the inner cities. This contribution aims to explain the structures in housing in the «Neuen Länder», which were caused during the existence of the German Democratic Republic.

The garden city as eugenic utopia

The exploitation of town planning and architecture for the objectives of race hygiene is decades older than the Third Reich. The idea of selective human breeding, propagated by Galton, Ploetz and others, appeared in one of Ebenezer Howard's diagrams of 1898, then more explicitly in the German garden cities organisation, where around 1910 the leading German eugenists were members of the board. In the 1920s, the myth of ‘New Man’ was riddled with eugenic thought in the ideological foundation of the whole reform architecture movement and the later Neues Bauen. One of the practical results during the Third Reich was a siedlung in Bremen, which was a garden‐city, a half‐open prison and a eugenistic selection centre all in one. Even in the 1950s the eugenic argument in the German housing and planning debate was still present.

The Flat Roof: A Modernist Controversy in Germany

No feature of the new architecture of the 1920s in Germany inspired such rhetoric from architects and journalists alike as the flat roof. The thought of it could provoke advocates and enemies of the Neues Bauen to pages of angry or praiseful words, fortified perhaps by international surveys of architects, cartoons, or doctored photographs (Fig. 1). The issue even flared into a War of the Roofs, as journalists called the confrontation of two housing projects in Berlin, one pitched-roofed and the other flat (Fig. 2). Flat roofs had a long history in Germany, as Walter Gropius indicated in an article of 1926, but none of the disputants then or laterseem to have understood the structure of the controversy in which they were engaged.