![WeissenhofsiedlungScharoun-pjt](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/WeissenhofsiedlungScharoun-pjt.jpg)
The Weissenhof Estate (German: Weißenhofsiedlung) is a
housing estate
A housing estate (or sometimes housing complex or housing development) is a group of homes and other buildings built together as a single development. The exact form may vary from country to country.
Popular throughout the United States a ...
built for the 1927
Deutscher Werkbund
The Deutscher Werkbund (English: "German Association of Craftsmen"; ) is a German association of artists, architects, designers and industrialists established in 1907. The Werkbund became an important element in the development of modern arch ...
exhibition in
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...
,
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
. It was an international showcase of
modern architecture
Modern architecture, or modernist architecture, was an architectural movement or architectural style based upon new and innovative technologies of construction, particularly the use of glass, steel, and reinforced concrete; the idea that form ...
's aspiration to provide cheap, simple, efficient, and good-quality housing.
Two buildings designed by
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...
were designated a
World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...
in 2016 as part of
The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier, an Outstanding Contribution to the Modern Movement
The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier, an Outstanding Contribution to the Modern Movement is a World Heritage Site consisting of a selection of 17 building projects in several countries by the Franco-Swiss architect Le Corbusier.Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ( ; ; born Maria Ludwig Michael Mies; March 27, 1886August 17, 1969) was a German-American architect. He was commonly referred to as Mies, his surname. Along with Alvar Aalto, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius and Frank Lloyd ...
was in charge of the project on behalf of the city, and selected the architects, budgeted and coordinated their entries, prepared the site, and oversaw construction. Le Corbusier was awarded the two prime sites, facing the city, and by far the largest budget.
The twenty-one buildings consist of
terrace
Terrace may refer to:
Landforms and construction
* Fluvial terrace, a natural, flat surface that borders and lies above the floodplain of a stream or river
* Terrace, a street suffix
* Terrace, the portion of a lot between the public sidewalk a ...
d and
detached house
A stand-alone house (also called a single-detached dwelling, detached residence or detached house) is a free-standing residential building. It is sometimes referred to as a single-family home, as opposed to a multi-family residential dwelling ...
s as well as apartment buildings. They vary slightly in form but display standardized design language. What they have in common are their simplified facades, flat roofs used as terraces, window bands, open plan interiors, and the high level of
prefabrication
Prefabrication is the practice of assembling components of a structure in a factory or other manufacturing site, and transporting complete assemblies or sub-assemblies to the construction site where the structure is to be located. The term is u ...
which permitted their erection in just five months. Despite popular belief, only about one third of the buildings were completely white.
Bruno Taut
Bruno Julius Florian Taut (4 May 1880 – 24 December 1938) was a renowned German architect, urban planner and author of Prussian Lithuanian heritage ("taut" means "nation" in Lithuanian). He was active during the Weimar period and is know ...
had his entry, the smallest, painted in various colors. Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret's entry was white, blue, orange, and green. Van der Rohe's was painted a light pink. The
eaves
The eaves are the edges of the roof which overhang the face of a wall and, normally, project beyond the side of a building. The eaves form an overhang to throw water clear of the walls and may be highly decorated as part of an architectural styl ...
of
Hans Scharoun
Bernhard Hans Henry Scharoun (20 September 1893 – 25 November 1972) was a German architect best known for designing the Berliner Philharmonie (home to the Berlin Philharmonic) and the Schminke House in Löbau, Saxony. He was an important ...
's entry were painted orange.
Advertised as a prototype of future workers' housing, in fact each of these houses was customized and furnished on a budget far out of a normal worker's reach and with little direct relevance to the technical challenges of standardized mass construction. The exhibition opened to the public on 23 July 1927, a year late, and drew large crowds.
Homes
Of the original twenty-one buildings, eleven survive as of 2006. Bombing damage during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
is responsible for the complete loss of the homes by Gropius, Hilberseimer, Bruno Taut, Poelzig, Max Taut (home 24), and Döcker. Another of Max Taut's homes (23) was demolished in the 1950s, as was Rading's.
List of homes
*1-4:
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ( ; ; born Maria Ludwig Michael Mies; March 27, 1886August 17, 1969) was a German-American architect. He was commonly referred to as Mies, his surname. Along with Alvar Aalto, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius and Frank Lloyd ...
*5-9:
J.J.P. Oud
*10:
Victor Bourgeois
Victor Bourgeois (29 August 1897 – 24 July 1962) was a Belgian architect and urban planner, considered the greatest Belgian modernist architect.
Bourgeois was born in Charleroi and studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels from ...
**Originally, the lot was to be built on by
Adolf Loos
Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos (; 10 December 1870 – 23 August 1933) was an Austrian and Czechoslovak architect, influential European theorist, and a polemicist of modern architecture. He was an inspiration to modernism and a widely-k ...
, but he was scrapped from the list after run-ins with and criticism of the Werkbund. Instead, Bourgeois built a home that was more traditional than the planned design by Loos, which was to have an . One unique feature is a wine cellar from
gravel
Gravel is a loose aggregation of rock fragments. Gravel occurs naturally throughout the world as a result of sedimentary and erosive geologic processes; it is also produced in large quantities commercially as crushed stone.
Gravel is classifi ...
rather than concrete. The two-story family home was damaged during the war, and was turned into a two-family dwelling afterward.
*11 and 12:
Adolf Gustav Schneck
Adolf Gustav Friedrich Schneck (1883–1971) was a German architect and furniture designer as well as a member of the Deutscher Werkbund and teacher at the Bauhaus. He contributed two buildings to the 1927 Weissenhofsiedlung exhibit and has work in ...
*13-15:
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...
and
Pierre Jeanneret
Pierre Jeanneret (22 March 1896 – 4 December 1967) was a Swiss architect who collaborated with his cousin, Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (who assumed the pseudonym Le Corbusier), for about twenty years.
Early life
Arnold-André-Pierre Jea ...
*16 and 17:
Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (18 May 1883 – 5 July 1969) was a German-American architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in conne ...
*18:
Ludwig Hilberseimer
Ludwig Karl Hilberseimer (September 14, 1885 – May 6, 1967) was a German architect and urban planner best known for his ties to the Bauhaus and to Mies van der Rohe, as well as for his work in urban planning at Armour Institute of Technology ( ...
**Designed for a family of six, painted in light gray. For reasons of economy, Hilberseimer's planned sliding windows were replaced with cheaper, conventional ones—when Hilberseimer visited the finished house, he did not recognize it. The building was destroyed in the war; a conventional home now occupies the plot.
*19:
Bruno Taut
Bruno Julius Florian Taut (4 May 1880 – 24 December 1938) was a renowned German architect, urban planner and author of Prussian Lithuanian heritage ("taut" means "nation" in Lithuanian). He was active during the Weimar period and is know ...
**Taut was part of the group on the recommendation of his older brother, Max Taut. House 19 is a single-family, two-story home with a basement, designed as a "proletarian's home." His house was painted red, blue, and yellow, and was destroyed in the war.
*20:
Hans Poelzig
Hans Poelzig (30 April 1869 – 14 June 1936) was a German architect, painter and set designer.
Life
Poelzig was born in Berlin in 1869 to Countess Clara Henrietta Maria Poelzig while she was married to George Acland Ames, an Englishman. Uncerta ...
**Poelzig's contribution is a single-family, two-story home with a winter garden and a sun terrace as prominent features. It was destroyed in the war.
*21 and 22:
Richard Döcker Richard Döcker (13 June 1894, Weilheim an der Teck - 9 November 1968, Stuttgart) was a German architect and professor associated with the functionalist style in architecture.
Biography
Döcker studied architecture from 1912 to 1918 at the Unive ...
**Döcker was assigned two lots in van der Rohe's plan, between Rathenaustraße and Bruckmannweg. He originally designed two connected homes, based on his belief in connections between buildings and spaces, but changed the plans after seeing that none of the other buildings on the estate were connected. Both were single-family homes, no. 22 with one and a half stories, including a garage (the only home on the estate with one). Döcker wanted brightly colored homes; what color they were painted can no longer be determined since both were destroyed completely in the war.
*23 and 24:
Max Taut
Max Taut (15 May 1884 – 26 February 1967) was a German architect of Prussian Lithuanian heritage.
Biography
Max Taut was born in Königsberg, the younger brother of Bruno Taut. He, his brother and Franz Hoffman formed Taut & Hoffman, an arc ...
*25:
Adolf Rading
*26 and 27:
Josef Frank
*28-30:
Mart Stam
Mart Stam (August 5, 1899 – February 21, 1986) was a Dutch architect, urban planner, and furniture designer. Stam was extraordinarily well-connected, and his career intersects with important moments in the history of 20th-century Europe ...
*31 and 32:
Peter Behrens
Peter Behrens (14 April 1868 – 27 February 1940) was a leading German architect, graphic and industrial designer, best known for his early pioneering AEG Turbine Hall in Berlin in 1909. He had a long career, designing objects, typefaces, and i ...
*33:
Hans Scharoun
Bernhard Hans Henry Scharoun (20 September 1893 – 25 November 1972) was a German architect best known for designing the Berliner Philharmonie (home to the Berlin Philharmonic) and the Schminke House in Löbau, Saxony. He was an important ...
**A much more curved design than the other (angular) buildings, Scharoun's is a single-family home with two stories and a basement.
See also
*
New Frankfurt
New Frankfurt (German: ''Neues Frankfurt'') was an affordable public housing program in Frankfurt started in 1925 and completed in 1930. It was also the name of the accompanying magazine that was published from 1926 to 1931 dedicated to interna ...
, Frankfurt 1925-32
*
Berlin Modernism Housing Estates
Berlin Modernism Housing Estates (german: Siedlungen der Berliner Moderne) is a World Heritage Site designated in 2008, comprising six separate subsidized housing estates in Berlin. Dating mainly from the years of the Weimar Republic (1919–1933 ...
, Berlin 1926
*
Bauhaus and its Sites in Weimar, Dessau and Bernau
Bauhaus and its Sites in Weimar, Dessau and Bernau is a World Heritage Site in Germany, comprising six separate sites which are associated with the Bauhaus art school. It was designated in 1996 with four initial sites, and in 2017 two further si ...
, 1923-1930
*
Le Corbusier's Five Points of Architecture
References
External links
The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier, an Outstanding Contribution to the Modern Movement / UNESCO Official Website*
Weissenhofmuseum
{{Authority control
International Style (architecture)
Buildings and structures in Stuttgart
Modernist architecture in Germany
Housing estates in Germany
Residential buildings completed in 1927
Modernist heritage districts