Transcript The International Style

The International Style
• Major architectural style in Europe & USA
• Began in the 1920’s – 1930’2 (1980’s)
• Term coined by Henry Russell Hitchcock
and Phillip Johnson
Philip Cortelyou Johnson
(1906-2005)
Henry-Russell Hitchcock (1903-1987)
The most important figures
“The big three”
Le Corbusier (France)
Ludwig Mies van Rohe (Germany)
Walter Gropius (Germany)
Nazi’s rejected the modern architecture forcing
an entire generation of architects out of Europe.
Mies fled to the USA in 1936 extending his
influence and promoting Bauhaus which later
became the primary source of architectural
modernism.
The International Style became the dominant
approach for decades.
The International Style was striving towards:
“Simplification, Honesty and Clarification”
The ideals of the style can be summed up in four
slogans:
“ornament is a crime”
“truth to materials”
“form follows function”
“machines for living”
(Le Corbusier)
Identifying features/characteristics
Modern structural principles and material (commercial and institutional
buildings rather than housing)
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Concrete
Glass
Steel (most common)
Occasionally reveals skeleton frame construction
Exposing its structure
Rejected non-essential decoration
Ribbon windows
Corner windows
Bands of glass
Balance and regularity
Flat roof, without ledge
Often with thin, metal mullions and smooth spandrel
panels separating large, single-pane windows
The typical International Style high-rise
usually consists of the following:
1. Square or rectangular footprint
2. Simple cubic "extruded rectangle" form
3. Windows running in broken horizontal rows
forming a grid
4. All facade angles are 90 degrees
The most famous manifestations include:
United Nations Headquarters
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Completed 1952
New York, NY
Le Corbusier
Seagram Building
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Completed 1957
New York, NY (park
avenue)
Ludwig Mies van
Der Rohe (and
Phillip Johnson)
Access to new building technologies like
reinforced concrete , and steel framework
for building meant that designers could
seek a whole new approach to what is
known as the plan or the layout of the
interiors of buildings.
The enormous strength of these new
materials opened new worlds for designers
that were unheard of in building before.
Glass Palace
(the Netherlands – Frits Peutz) 1935
Ludwig Mies Van der
Rohewig
Chicago, Illinois 1949
Ludwig Mies Van der Rohewig
Chicago, Illinois 1973
Gropius House
Walter Gropius
The Farnsworth House
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
International Style glass house
Philip Johnson 1949