German lit.

“Architecture
House”
From Bau = Building (Bauen=to
Build)
+ Haus = house

“House of Construction”

"School of Building"

the
1919-1933

bauhaus
Beginnings & influence
•• The
Defeatentire movement
in World WarofI,German
the fall of
architectural
the German modernism
monarchy andwas known
the
as Neues
abolitionBauen. Beginning
of censorship in June
under the new,
1907, Peter Behrens' pioneering industrial
liberal Weimar Republic allowed an
design work for the German electrical
upsurge of radical experimentation in
company AEG successfully integrated art
all the
and massarts, previously
production on asuppressed
large scale by
the old regime
• 19th century English designer William
• Morris
The Bauhaus was that
had argued founded at a time
art should meet
when
the theof
needs German zeitgeist ("spirit of
society and that there should
theno
be times") had turned
distinction betweenfrom
form and
emotional Expressionism to the
function
matter-of-fact New Objectivity
 Bauhaus/ Gropius’ Manifesto
Lyonel Feininger, Cathedral, woodcut,  desire, conceive, and create the new building of the future
Cover of 1st program of Bauhaus
April 1919
The ultimate aim of all creative activity is a building! The
decoration of buildings was once the noblest function of
fine arts, and fine arts were indispensable to great
architecture. Today they exist in complacent
isolation, and can only be rescued by the conscious co-
operation and collaboration of all craftsmen. Architects,
painters, and sculptors must once again come to know and
comprehend the composite character of a building, both as
an entity and in terms of its various parts. Then their work
will be filled with that true architectonic spirit which, as
“salon art”, it has lost.” ... “Architects, painters, sculptors,
we must all return to crafts! For there is no such thing as
“professional art”. There is no essential difference between
the artist and the craftsman. The artist is an exalted
craftsman.” ... “Let us therefore create a new guild of
craftsmen without the class-distinctions that raise an
arrogant barrier between craftsmen and artists! Let us
together. It will combine architecture, sculpture, and
painting in a single form
Bauhaus Goals

• Encourage the individual

artisan and craftsman to work
cooperatively and combine
their skills;
• Elevate the status of crafts,
chairs, lamps, teapots, etc., to
the same level enjoyed by fine
arts, painting, sculpting, etc.,
• Eventually gain independence
from government support by
selling designs to industry.
 Bauhaus Style
• Geometric
• Functional as in “Fitness of purpose”
• Asymmetry
• Rectangular grid structures
• Decorations limited to heavy rules,
rectangles, circles
• Photography and montage instead of
realistic drawing
• Influenced by Di Stijl “The Style” &
Constructivism
• San Serif typefaces
Joost Schmidt Poster for Bauhaus Exhibition in
Weimar, July- September 1923 • No distinction of upper and lower
case
Bauhaus at Weimar (1919-1925)
 Bauhaus at Weimar (1919-1925)
• founded by Walter Gropius in
1919 as a merger of the Grand
Ducal School of Arts and
Crafts and the Weimar
Academy of Fine Art
– school founded by the Grand
Duke of Saxe-Weimar-
Eisenach in 1906 and directed by
Belgian Art Nouveau architect 
Johannes Auerbach, First Bauhaus Seal Henry van de Velde who was
1919 forced to resign in 1915 because
he was Belgian
(TheState Home for Building)
Walter Adolph Gropius 
(May 18, 1883 – July 5, 1969)

• could not draw

• German architect
• dependent on collaborators and partner-
interpreters throughout his career
•• Born in Berlin
In school, hired an assistant to complete his
homework
•• third child of Walter
In 1908, worked in the firm of Peter
Behrens, one of the first members of the
Adolph Gropius, an
utilitarian school
•
architect, and Manon
His fellow employees at this time
included Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
• Auguste Pauline
career was interrupted by World War I in
1914
• Scharnweber
served as a sergeant major at the Western
front and was wounded and almost killed
 Works (Pre-Bauhaus)

• (1921) Sommerfeld
Bauhaus SchoolFactory
Fagus and Faculty at Dessau
(1910-1911)
House, Berlin, Germany (1925-1932)
designed for Adolf
Sommerfeld
Works (during Bauhaus)
In 1923, Gropius
designed his famous
• the armchair F 51,
door handles, now
designed for the
considered an icon of
Bauhaus's directors
20th-century design
roomandin often
1920listed
- as one
of the most
nowadays influentialin
a re-edition
designs to emerge
the market,
from Bauhaus.
manufactured by the
German company
TECTA/Lauenfoerde
 Works (Post-Bauhaus)

1958–1963 Pan Am Building (now
1936 Village College, Impington, Cambridge, England
the Metlife Building), New
1949–1950 Harvard Graduate Center, Cambridge, York,
Massachusetts,
with Pietro
USA (The Architects' Belluschi and
Collaborative) [ project
architects Emery Roth & Sons
1960 Temple Oheb Shalom (Baltimore,
Maryland)
The Gropius House

1937 The Gropius House, Lincoln,

Massachusetts USA
The Groupius
Gropius House
House
• The Gropius House was the
family residence of noted
architect Walter Gropius at
68 Baker Bridge
Road,Lincoln, Massachusetts
• The house was built with
economy in mind, and total
construction costs were
$18,000
• It was declared a National
Historic Landmark in 2000
 Bauhaus at Weimar (1919-1925)
•
•• Weimar was
 In 1919 "Students at the Bauhaus took a six-
month Swiss in the
preliminary course that
involved painting and elementary
German
painter Johannes
state with form,Itten,
experiments before
graduating to three years of
of Thuringia,
German-American
workshop trainingand the
by two masters:
one artist, one craftsman. They
Bauhaus
painter Lyonelschool
studied architecturereceived
in theory and in
practice, working on the actual
state
Feininger,
support and
construction fromGerman
of buildings. The
creative scope of the curriculum
the Social
sculptor Gerhard Democrat-
attracted an extraordinary galaxy of
teaching staff. Among the stars
controlled Thuringian st
Marcks, werealong withKandinsky,
Paul Klee, Wassily
Oskar Schlemmer, the painter and
ate
Gropius,
government.
mysticcomprised
Johannes Itten, Lászlóthe
Johannes Auerbach, First Bauhaus Seal
1919
facultyMoholy-Nagy,
of the Josef Albers and
Bauhaus
Marcel Breuer. Bauhaus students
were in day-to-day contact with
some of the most important
(TheState Home for Building) practicing artists and designers of
the time.”
 Vorkurs
• From 1919 to 1922 the school was shaped
by the pedagogical and aesthetic ideas
of Johannes Itten who taught the
preliminary course that was the
introduction to the ideas of the Bauhaus
• the modern day "Basic Design" course that
has become one of the key foundational
courses offered in architectural and design
schools across the globe
Johannes Itten
(11 November 1888 – 27 May 1967)

• Swiss expressionist pain
ter, designer, teacher,
writer and theorist
• master color theorist
whose teachings and
books on color and
design are still used
today
 Vorkurs
Vorkurs
• When Itten resigned in late 1922, Itten
was replaced by the Hungarian
designer László Moholy-Nagy, who
rewrote the Vorkurs with a leaning
towards the New Objectivity favored by
Gropius, which was analogous in some
ways to the applied arts side of the
debate
László Moholy-Nagy
(July 20, 1895, – Nov 24, 1946)
• a Jewish-Hungarian painter and
In 1923, replaced Johannes Itten as
the instructor of the Vorkras
photographer
•• born
endedLászló
of the Weisz to a Jewish-
school’s expressionistic leanings
Hungarian family
and moved it closer towards its
• changed his German-Jewish
original aims as a school of design
surname to theintegration
and industrial Magyar
• surname
Brought withof his
himmother's
new materials
friend, Nagy
(acrylic, resin, plastic) and added
• Later,
interestheinadded
photography and film
“Moholy” to
his surname, after the name of
the town Mohol in which he
grew up. 
László Moholy-Nagy
(July 20, 1895, – Nov 24, 1946)
• one of the Fathers
of Light art
• Photograms
• Photoplastics
• Used the camera as a
tool for design
• Used experimental
composition and
experimented with point
of view
László Moholy-Nagy
(July 20, 1895, – Nov 24, 1946)
• Light sculpture and
moving sculpture are the
components of his 
Light-Space Modulator
 (1922–30)
• One of the first light art
pieces which also
combined kinetic art
László Moholy-Nagy
(July 20, 1895, – Nov 24, 1946)

• Believed in clarity of
typography with
emphasis on legibility
• Invented the typophoto
 László Moholy-Nagy
(July 20, 1895, – Nov 24, 1946)
• In 1937, at the invitation of Walter Paepcke, the Chairman of
the Container Corporation of America, Moholy-Nagy moved
to Chicago to become the director of the New Bauhaus
• the school lost the financial backing of its supporters after
only a single academic year, and it closed in 1938
• In 1939, Moholy-Nagy opened the School of Design
• In 1944, this became the Institute of Design
• In 1949 the Institute of Design became a part of Illinois
Institute of Technology and became the first institution in the
United States to offer a PhD in design
• resigned from the Bauhaus in 1928
Bauhaus at Weimar (1919-1925)
• From 1923 the school in
Weimar came under political
pressure from right-wing
circles, until on December
26, 1924 it issued a press
release accusing the
government and setting the
closure of the school for the
end of March 1925.
Bauhaus at Dessau (1925-1932)
• The Bauhaus was welcomed by the
•  The Dessau years saw a
mayor of Dessau in 1925
• remarkable change in
Suitable location because its heavy
direction
industry could forbethe school. 
used to produce
• Gropius
Bauhaus products
had approached the
• Dutch
A modern building complex was
architect Mart
erected out of concrete glass and
Stam to
steel
run the newly-
founded
The Bauhaus masters on •the Gropius
architecture
roof of the designed classrooms,
Bauhaus building in Dessau. From the
left: Josef Albers, Hinnerkprogram,
dormitories and
Scheper, Georgand
Muche,when
László
faculty Stam
Moholy-Nagy,
housing
Herbert Bayer, Joost Schmidt, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Vassily
Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Lyoneldeclined
that the position,
were grouped
Feininger, Gunta
in a complete
Stölzl and Oskar Schlemme
artistic community
Gropius turned to Stam's
friend and colleague in the
ABC group, Hannes Meyer
Hannes Meyer 
(Nov 18, 1889–July 19, 1954)

•• Swiss Architect
• brought his radical
forced the resignations
functionalist viewpoint
of Herbert Bayer, Marcel Breuer,
"1. sex life, 2. sleeping habits, 3. pets,
 called
and otherDie neue instructors
long-time
4. gardening, 5. personal hygiene, 6.
• Baulehre (the
encouraged
weather new
the formation
protection, 7. wayinofto
hygiene the
a communist student
build)
home, 8. car maintenance, 9. cooking,
10. heating, 11. exposure to the sun, 12.
organization
• architecture
services was
- these are the an
only motives
• favored
when measurements
organizational
building task
a house. and no the
Wewith
examine
calculations
routine ofin
daily
relationship tohisaesthetics
everyonepresentations
who lives in
to clients,
the house andalong withusthe
this gives the use of
• buildings
functional should
diagram
off-the-shelf - thebe low cost
functional
architectural
and designed
diagram
components to fulfill
and thetoeconomic
reduce social
programme
costs, and
are the determining principles of the
needs
this approach proved attractive
building project."(Meyer, 1928)
• to potential
also clients
an ardent Marxist
Marianne Brandt 
(1 Oct 1893 – 18 June 1983)
• German painter, sculptor, p
unable to find steady work
throughout the period
hotographer and of
designer 
the Third
• trained as Reich
a painter before
• joining
In 1939,
thebecame
Weimara
member of
Bauhaus in the
1923
"Reichskulturkammer,"
• student of Hungarian
the officialtheorist
modernist Nazi and
organization of artists
designer László Moholy-
• Nagy
was never a member of
the National
• became head Socialist
of the metal
Party
workshop in 1928
Works
• Brandt's designs for metal
ashtrays, tea and coffee
services, lamps and other
household objects are now
recognized as among the
best of the Bauhaus
• They were among the few
Bauhaus designs to be mass-
produced during the
interwar period, and several
of them are currently
available as reproductions
Works
• Beginning in 1926, also
produced a body of
photomontage work
• often focus on the complex
situation of women in the
interwar period, a time when
they enjoyed new freedoms in
work, fashion and sexuality,
yet frequently experienced
traditional prejudices
• Tempo, Tempo! The
Bauhaus Photomontages of
Marianne Brandt"
Marcel Lajos Breuer 
(21 May 1902  – 1 July 1981) 

• architect and furniture designer,
was an influential Hungarian-
born modernist of Jewish descent
• Studied at Bauhaus and later
headed the school's carpentry
workshop in the 1920s
• pioneered the design of tubular
steel furniture
• Later in his career he would also
turn his attention to the creation
of innovative and experimental
wooden furniture
Works
• Wassily Chair
• Model B3 chair
A cantilever chair
•• African
relocated
Named Chair
to London,
“Wassily”
a chair with no back at
by the
• Laccio Table
• the Isokon
Italian
legs
created withcompany
maufacturer
Gunta
• As a apprentice in 1925,
•• Gavina
Stölzl
designed Long
relying for Chair
support on
conceived as a
•• First
the
Made tubular
properties
experimenting
of steel
paintedof chair
the
with
wood
companion to the
• material
with
bent aand
based
Wassily colorful
on formed
the
chair textile
tubed
• weave
plywood
frame of a bicycle
designed byMart
Stam in 1926
Marcel Lajos Breuer 
(21 May 1902  – 1 July 1981) 

• taught at Harvard's architecture

school, working
• worked with Walter Gropius
• established his own firm in New
York.
• The Geller House I of 1945 is the
first to employ Breuer's concept of
the 'binuclear' house
Geller House I
• separate wings for
the bedrooms and
for the living /
dining / kitchen
area, separated by
an entry hall
• with the distinctive
'butterfly' roof
• two opposing roof
surfaces sloping
towards the
middle, centrally
drained
Marcel Lajos Breuer 
(21 May 1902  – 1 July 1981) 

• Between 1963 and 1964, Breuer began work on

what is perhaps his best-known project,
the Whitney Museum of American Art, in New
York City
Demise
Bauhaus
of the
at Bauhaus
Berlin
• Labeled the Bauhaus• "un-German"
In 1979, theandBauhaus
criticized its
• modernist
In 1931styles,
the Nazis • The Bauhaus
canceled
deliberately moved
faculty
generating public to
contracts over
at the Archive,
Berlin
Bauhaus designed
briefly in by
1932
controversy issues like flat roofs
Gropius, was built in
•• AMies van der Rohe • Atried
front for communists and rise of
to
social the
run National
the
liberals
• Aschool
number from
of communist
West Berlin
students loyal
Socialist
an empty Partyto (Nazis)
telephone Meyer
factory
moved to the Soviet•Union when
in Berlin-Steglitz In 1997 the
in Dessau building
he was
forced fired in 1930
the
was
• The Nazi regime was determined placed
closure of under
to crack
the down on
school in
• what
TheitNazi Gestapo demanded
saw as the foreign, the removal
historical
1933 protection and
of “Cultural Bolsheviks”
probably Jewish influences from
of "cosmopolitan
has been completely
modernism." • The last
the school and replace them director was
with unified
• On August
renovated
10, 1933 theMies
faculty voted
under
to close
Nazi sympathizers van der Rohethe
school. Germany.
 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe 
(March 27, 1886 – August 17, 1969)

• German architect
•• Tried
settledto in Chicago,
eradicate the
Illinois where
subversive he was
elements in the
appointed
student bodyas head of the
architecture
• expelled all ofschool at
the students
Chicago's
and Armouronly
then readmitted
Institute
the ones who of Technology
were
perceived as politically
(later renamed Illinois
acceptable
Institute of
S.R. Crown Hall • “Less is more.” IIT)
Technology -
860-880 Lake Shore Drive Apartments • “God is in the details.”
Seagram Building, New York
Herbert
The New
Bayer (1900
Typography
– 1985)
• In 1928,•Bayer Austrian graphic
left the Bauhaus to become art
• In 1925,
director of Vogue Gropius
magazine's Berlin office
•• InSerifs
1937,
designer,
commissioned
are works
unnecessary painter,
of Bayer's were Bayer to design
included in
• the
No Nazi
need for photographer,
aan upper and lower case for
typeface
propaganda exhibition sculptor,
for all Bauhaus each letter
"Degenerate
• To simplify typesetting and typewriter keyboard layout
Art
whichDirector,
Art", uponcommuniqués he left Germany
and Bayer
• In1. 1938 to excitedly
settle in New York City where
undertook this task.he
Typography environmental
is shaped by functional & interior
requirements.
had a long He and took
distinguished
advantage career
of hisin nearly
every aim ofdesigner
2. The aspect typographic
of the graphic and Architect
layout is communication (for
arts
which it is theviews
graphicofmedium).
modern typography
Communication to
must
1946in•Hired
• Inappear the
thecreate bylast
shortest, an living
industrialist
simplest, member
mostand
"idealist typeface.”
penetrating form. of
visionary Walter Paepcke, Bayer moved
• The the Bauhaus
3. For typography
to Aspen,
result
Colorado asto serve was
social "universal"
Paepcke ends,promoted -a
its ingredients
need internalsimple
organization geometric
- (ordered sans-serif
content) as well as
skiing as• Was trained
a popular
external organization
sport. in
Bayer's
(the typographic Art architectural
material properly
work in thefont
related) town included co-designing
Nouveourestoring the Wheeler
the Aspen Institute and
Opera House
Jan Tschichold
 (2 April 1902  – 11 August 1974)

• was a typographer, book

designer, teacher and
writer
• His artisan background
and calligraphic training
set him apart from almost
all other noted
typographers of the time,
since they had inevitably
trained in architecture or
the fine arts
Jan Tschichold
 (2 April 1902  – 11 August 1974)

• In October of 1925 Jan

Tishcichold
produced a supplement
to the
Tyoegraphische
Mitteilungen called
elementare
typographie
• Demonstrated an
asymmetrical layout
Jan Tschichold
 (2 April 1902  – 11 August 1974)
• In his 1928 book, Die Neue
Tipographie vigorously defended
the new ideas
1. Asymmetrical typography to
convey the spirit and visual
sensitivity of the time
2. Functional design by the most
direct communication in the
shortest, most efficient way
3. Rejection of decoration for the
rational design
4. Sans serif type
5. White space as a structural interval
6. Use of base grid
Jan Tschichold
 (2 April 1902  – 11 August 1974)

• Between 1947-1949,
lived in England where
he oversaw the redesign
of 500 paperbacks
published by Penguin
Books, leaving them
with a standardized set
of typographic rules,
the Penguin
Composition Rules.
The Penguin Poets redesign by Jan Tschichold (1948)
Two early examples of titles from the Penguin Poets series: (left) John
Overton’s [?] original design of 1946 and (right) Jan Tschichold’s
reformed design of 1951
The Penguin Classics redesign by Jan Tschichold 1949
Two early examples of titles from the Penguin Classics series: (left) John
Overton’s original design of 1945 and (right) Jan Tschichold’s reformed design of
1949. Both feature circular illustrations (roundels) by William Grimmond.
Jan Tschichold’s redesign for Pelican Books 1949
Two examples of early Pelican titles: (left) Edward Young’s original
horizontal grid design of 1937 and (right) Jan Tschichold’s reformed
design of 1949.
The Penguin Shakespeare redesign by Jan Tschichold 1949
The Penguin Shakespeare series: Edward Young’s [?] original design
(1938) and Jan Tschichold’s revision (1949)
Penguin’s horizontal grid design and Tschichold’s reforms
Two examples of early Penguin paperback covers: Edward Young’s
horizontal grid of the 1930s and Jan Tschichold’s reformed design of the
1950s.