Contributions appreciated

“Since the period of the Berliner Tageblatt building, Mendelsohn had developed a strong association with the editor Rudolf Mosse, who appreciated not only Mendelsohn’s creative abilities, but also his intellectual acuity and literary versatility. This heating plant is another inspired work, using vertical panels of white brickwork, articulated and partly separated by metal uprights and beams. The disparity in height between the two blocks is emphasized by the curved profile, which avoids a mere confrontation between rectangular volumes. On both sides, the low windows of the upper floor create ventilation. The window of the main facade cuts across the entire building, while that on the side facade occupies two areas and is connected to a door. This precise work demonstrates that Mendelsohn’s skill did not depend solely upon a violently plastic form of expression.”

— from Bruno Zevi. Erich Mendelsohn. p82.

The Creator's Words

“His first sketches were, indeed, the clue to everything that follows.…It was the ‘criterion against which he would check all future development…’ ‘Look at my sketch,’ he would say. ‘There is everything in it.’

“Yet, intutive design was always balanced by the other pole—the rational. Mendelsohn agreed with Gropius, Mies, and Le Corbusier that ‘certainly, the primary element in architecture is function.’ But ‘function without sensibility remains mere construction,’ he added. ‘If the rationalists’ blood does not freeze, and mere imagination goes a step further towards ratio, then they may unite. Otherwise both will be destroyed—the functionalist by a deadly chill in his veins, the dynamicist by the heat of his own fire. Thus, function plus dynamics is the challenge!’ ”

— Erich Mendelsohn and Hans Schiller, assistant to Mendelsohn. from Wolf Von Eckardt. Eric Mendelsohn. p11.