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	Tugendhat House
Designer	Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Location	Brno, Czech Republic
Date	1930
Building Type	house
Climate	temperate
Context	urban
Architectural Style	Modern
Street Address	Černopolní ulice (Schwarzfeldgasse, Black field street) 45
Notes	thin + shape columns held in from exterior walls. glazed wall toward views. entry from 'back'. interior recalls Barcelona Pavilion.
At Great Buildings	http://www.GreatBuildings.com/buildings/Tugendhat_House.html

Contents 1 Images 2 Discussion 2.1 Related Content from Wikipedia 3 Maps 4 References 5 External Links

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[edit] Discussion

UNESCO World Heritage Sites
Name	Tugendhat Villa in Brno
UNESCO State Party	Czech Republic
Region	Europe and North America
Type	Cultural
Criteria	ii, iv
UNESCO Site ID	1052
Year of Listing	2001

Building Details

Tugendhat House by Mies van der Rohe, Brno, Czech republic, 1928-1930

By several fortunate coincidences, in the years 1928-1930, an uncompromising design for a family villa was produced, the originality of which entered the history of modern architecture as one of its monuments that cannot be overlooked. The design was created by the last director of the Bauhaus, the architect Mies van den Rohe (1886-1969), who later settled in the USA. The Villa Tugenhat is the most important work by this architect in Europe. The building was damaged during the war and in the the communist era its meaning was not appreciated. Only recently was it opened to the public as a museum. Its revolutionary concept rejected the traditional arrangement of the interior and advocated simplicity of its exterior form. The house, situated on a south-facing slope, with a beautiful view of the profile of the city, is accessible from the street on the top floor shaped like a low rigorous rectangular. The main living quarters, piano nobile, faces the garden and lies below street level. For the first time use was made in a construction meant for living in, the radical idea of "freely floating space". Free, as if without borders, gradually changing space, covering an area of around 230m2 completely open on two sides with an uninterrupted glass wall facing the garden. The exterior is drawn in and becomes a part of the interior. The space is dominated by a freely placed onyx wall 3.2 by 6.26 m, around which as if concentrates the core of the house. Construction elements are reduced to thin steel pillars situated in a regular grid on cross-like ground plan. They are chromium-coated with invisible joints and suggest an almost immaterial nature. The shorter eastern side is divided from the exterior with an inserted winter garden. The functional zones of the whole space (working, reception, for rest, and for dining) were only defined by the arrangement of armchairs, tables and light curtains. Daylight became the decisive element of the overall atmosphere of the environment, changing during the day practically every hour. During construction a number of ingenious technical achievements, unknown until then, including two windows 3x5 m embedded in the floor, a unique system of heating and air circulation, as well as construction novelties. The attention to detail and perfect craftsmanship testifies to the quality of the suppliers. An important part of the building was the furnishings. Without exaggerating it can be said that van der Rohe devoted as much attention to the furnishing of the house as to the design of the house itself. The furniture proposed by him and laid out according to his suggestions was such an important part of the design that without it the villa would only have been half as significant. The order, which organises all components of the construction - relationships, proportions, whole segments and details, is also apparent in the exact layout of the furniture, which left very limited variability of space for the owner. The materials that were used - glass, polished stone, precious wood, polished chromium-plated steel - gave the interior, owing to their ultimate aesthetic qualities, unique qualities. Most furniture was specially designed for the villa, and it was made from bent chromium or nickel-plated steel, glass and wood. But from the original furnishing of the villa, only two built-in wardrobes have been preserved. Mr. and Mrs. Tugendhat came from well-to-do Jewish families, entrepreneurs in the textiles industry. They only lived in the villa for 8 years. In 1938 they left the house forever and went to Venezuela. In October 1939 the house was taken over by the Gestapo and the main space of the house became the design studio for Messerschmidt. In 1944 the house was damaged by a bomb which exploded in the garden. The damaged house remained unoccupied until the end of the war, and the original furnishings were irretrievably lost (from the original 49 pieces designed by van der Rohe, only 4 exist, in the ownership of the Moravian Gallery in Brno). At the end of April 1945, a small group of Red Army soldiers moved in, with their horses. After they left the house served as a gymnasium. In the early 60's, the issue of its reconstruction in its original state and using it for cultural purposes was raised. A controversial reconstruction took place in the years 1983-85.

- © Miroslav Ambroz

Commentary

"The plan repeats that of the Barcelona Pavilion, the onyx wall and the curved one of Macassar ebony being independent of the cruciform- shaped columns. The floor is of white linoleum, the rug white wool. The curtains are of black and natural raw silk and white velvet. Behind the dining room a double glass partition serves as a light source for the interior space, as in the Barcelona design.

The hillside site suggested a two-story scheme with the entry and bedrooms above with the main floor below. Across the living and dining areas the entire wall is of glass. Two of these large panes slide down into pockets as in an automobile window. A terrace and flight of steps connect the house to the garden below. At one end the glass is doubled to provide a narrow conservatory running the depth of the plan. The juxtaposition of geometry with nature is most effective, the simplicity of forms enhancing the natural setting."

— A. James Speyer. Mies van der Rohe. p42.

The Creator's Words

"Of my European work, the Tugendhat House is considered outstanding, but I think only because it was the first house to use rich materials, to have great elegance. At that time modern buildings were still austerely functional. I personally don't consider the Tugendhat House more important than other works I designed considerably earlier."

— Mies van der Rohe. from Frank Russell, ed. Mies van der Rohe: European Works. p20.

"Architecture is the will of the epoch translated into space. Until this simple truth is clearly recognized, the new architecture will be uncertain and tentative. Until then it must remain a chaos of undirected forces. The question as to the nature of architecture is of decisive importance. It must be understood that all architecture is bound up with its own time, that it can only be manifested in living tasks and in the medium of its epoch. In no age has it been otherwise."

— Mies van der Rohe. from John Zukowsky, organizer. Mies Reconsidered: His Career, Legacy, and Disciples. p17.

[edit] Related Content from Wikipedia

Above content from Wikipedia available under GFDL retrieved Thu, 08 Jan 2009 17:51:14 -0800

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[edit] References

Edward R. Ford. The Details of Modern Architecture. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1990. ISBN 0-262-06121-X. LC 89-31772. NA2840.F67 1989. terior and interior photos, construction section/anonmetric details, p272-277. drawing of wall section at living room detail, p272. Museum of Modern Art, drawings 2.108, 2.249, and 2.265.   Highly recommended for serious observers, and available at Amazon.com

Kenneth Frampton and Yukio Futagawa. Modern Architecture 1920-1945. New York: Rizzoli, 1983. exterior and interior photos, plans, p331-332.— Available at Amazon.com

Frank Russell, ed. Architectural Monographs 11: Mies van der Rohe, European Works. New York: St Martin's Press, 1986. NA1088.M65M54 1986. ISBN 0-312-053214-8. LC 86-042539. p20.

A. James Speyer. Mies van der Rohe. Chicago: Hillison & Etten, 1968. NA1088.M65S6. p42.

Wolf Tegethoff. Mies van der Rohe, the Villias and Country Houses. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1985. photo of interior, f11.25. photo of front, f11.20.

John Zukowsky, organizer. Mies Reconsidered: His Career, Legacy, and Disciples. Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, New York: Rizzoli International Publications, 1986. ISBN 0-8478-0771-1. LC 86-17303. NA2707.M55A4 1986. p17.

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