Mies van der Rohe - The Built Work

Mies Van der Rohe the built work

Mies van der rohe The builT Work Carsten Krohn

Mies Van der Rohe the built work Carsten Krohn

Birkh채user Basel

Layout, cover design and typography: Annette Kern, Hamburg Copy editing and project management: Henriette Mueller-Stahl, Berlin Translation from German into English: Julian Reisenberger, Weimar Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the ­Library of Congress.

Bibliographic information published by the German National Lib­ rary. The German National Library lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, re-use of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in other ways, and storage in databases. For any kind of use, permission of the copyright owner must be obtained.

This book is also available in a German language edition (ISBN 978–3–0346–0739–1).

© 2014 Birkhäuser Verlag GmbH, Basel P.O. Box 44, 4009 Basel, Switzerland Part of De Gruyter Printed on acid-free paper produced from chlorine-free pulp. TCF ∞ Printed in Germany ISBN 978–3–0346–0740–7 987654321 www.birkhauser.com

We kindly thank FSB Franz Schneider Brakel GmbH+Co KG for their support.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

8

Introduction

16

Riehl House Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1908

20

Perls House Berlin-Zehlendorf, Germany, 1911–12

24

Kröller-Müller House, Façade Mock-up Wassenaar, Netherlands, 1912–13

28

Werner House Berlin-Zehlendorf, Germany, 1912–13

32

Warnholtz House Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany, 1914–15

33

Urbig House Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1915–17

35

Tombstone for Laura Perls Berlin-Weißensee, Germany, 1919

36

Kempner House Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany, 1921–23

40

Eichstaedt House Berlin-Nikolassee, Germany, 1921–23

41

Feldmann House Berlin-Grunewald, Germany, 1921–23

42

Ryder House Wiesbaden, Germany, 1923–27

43

Gymnasium for Frau Butte’s Private School Potsdam, Germany, 1924–25

44

Mosler House Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1924–26

49

Urban House, Conversion Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany, 1924–26

50

Housing on the Afrikanische Straße Berlin-Wedding, Germany, 1925–27

56

Wolf House Guben, Poland, 1925–27

57

Monument to Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg Berlin-Lichtenberg, Germany, 1926

58

Weißenhofsiedlung Apartment Block Stuttgart, Germany, 1926–27

62

Glass Room Stuttgart, Germany, 1927

63

Samt und Seide Café (Velvet and Silk Café) Berlin, Germany, 1927

64

Fuchs Gallery, Addition to the Perls House Berlin-Zehlendorf, Germany, 1927–28

5

68

Lange and Esters Houses Krefeld, Germany, 1927–30

128

Crown Hall Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1950–56

76

Barcelona Pavilion International Exposition, Barcelona, Spain, 1928–29

134

IIT Halls of Residence Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1951–55

81

German Electrical Industry Pavilion World Exposition, Barcelona, Spain, 1929

136

Association of American Railroads Mechanical Laboratory Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1952–53

82

Tugendhat House Brno, Czech Republic, 1928–30

137

Commons Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1952–54

88

Henke House, Addition Essen, Germany, 1930

138

Electrical Engineering and Physics Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1954–56

89

Verseidag Factory Krefeld, Germany, 1930–31, 1935

139

Association of American Railroads Engineering Laboratory Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1955–57

94

Model House for the Berlin Building Exposition Berlin, Germany, 1931

140

Siegel Hall Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1955–58

95

Trinkhalle (Refreshment Stand) Dessau, Germany, 1932

142

Farnsworth House Plano, Illinois, USA, 1945–51

96

Lemke House Berlin-Hohenschönhausen, Germany, 1932–33

148

Promontory Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1946–49

102

Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago, USA, 1941–58

152

Algonquin Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1948–50

106

Minerals and Metals Research Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1941–43, 1956–58

153

Arts Club of Chicago Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1948–51

111

Engineering Research Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1943–46

154

860–880 Lake Shore Drive Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1948–51

112

Perlstein Hall Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1944–47

159

McCormick House Elmhurst, Illinois, USA, 1951–52

114

Alumni Memorial Hall Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1945–46

160

Greenwald House Weston, Connecticut, USA, 1951–56

118

Wishnick Hall Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1945–46

161

Commonwealth Promenade Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1953–57

120

Central Vault Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1946

162

Esplanade Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1953–57

121

Institute of Gas Technology Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1947–50

166

Seagram Building New York, USA, 1954–58

122

Association of American Railroads Research Laboratory Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1948–50

172

Lafayette Park Detroit, Michigan, USA, 1955–58

123

Boiler Plant Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1948–50

178

Colonnade and Pavilion Apartments Newark, New Jersey, USA, 1958–60

124

Chapel Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1949–52

182

Bacardi Office Building Mexico City, Mexico, 1958–61

126

Test Cell Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1950–52

184

One Charles Center Baltimore, Maryland, USA, 1958–62

127

Mechanics Research Building Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, 1950–52

186

Lafayette Towers Detroit, Michigan, USA, 1959–63

6

188

Federal Center Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1959–74

192

Home Federal Savings and Loan Association Des Moines, Iowa, USA, 1960–63

194

2400 Lakeview Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1962–63

196

Highfield House Baltimore, Maryland, USA, 1962–64

202

Social Service Administration University of Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1962–64

204

Meredith Hall Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa, USA, 1962–65

206

Science Center Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, 1962–68

208

Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin-Tiergarten, Germany, 1962–68

216

Toronto-Dominion Centre Toronto, Canada, 1963–69

220

Westmount Square Montreal, Canada, 1964–68

224

Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library Washington, D.C., USA, 1965–72

226

Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Texas, USA, 1954–58, 1965–74

228

Nuns’ Island Apartments Montreal, Canada, 1966–69

230

IBM Building Chicago, USA, 1966–72

232

111 East Wacker Drive Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1967–70

234

Service Station Montreal, Canada, 1968

236

Subject Index

Illustration Credits

237 238 240

Chronological Bibliography

About the Author

7

Riehl House Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1908

16

Although the house for a philosophy professor is situated in a col­ ony of villas in what is now Potsdam, Mies noted that “the house was not a villa. Rather, its character resembled the houses in the Märkische region, like those in Werder which have a simple pitched roof, a gable and a pair of dormers, usually of the eyebrow kind.”1 Despite the modest appearance of the building, the basic typology has been significantly modified and reinterpreted. Rather than arranging the long side parallel to the street, as is typical for this house type, the building is rotated by 90 degrees and turns away from the street, a gesture reinforced by the wall along the front.

Mies introduced a large step in the terrain of the steep slop­ ing site to create a plinth on which the building stands, affording a view of the Griebnitzsee lake. Both parts, the house and the plinth, are fused to form a single structure. On entering the garden, one is immediately drawn into the architectural composition, as the upper terrace is already part of the constellation. Enclosed by a peri­meter wall, the garden has a cloister-like intimacy that continues into the interior of the building.

In the centre of the house, Mies took the bold step at this early juncture in his career of creating a “general space”, a term that was used in a prominent publication of the day to denote a room with no specific function.2 In the book in question, such halls are described simply as the “central room of the house”, followed by a detailed elaboration of their composition: “Even in small houses halls always have a fire-place. Halls are furnished and their floors are carpeted. Wood panelling is the favourite treatment for walls, indeed it is considered the ideal dec­ oration. […] In all circumstances, the hall is not permitted to rise through two storeys […]. The floor may be composed of […] a hard wood. All-over carpeting is avoided […]. But there is always a deeppiled, warm rug in the centre and a thick one in front of the fire […].

[Where the staircase leads out of the hall], architects are ­reluctant to expose the whole flight to view and permit only the first few steps to be seen. […] In the […] country-house it is con­cealed because it leads only to the bedrooms, which are consider­ed to be private. […] There are certain pieces of furniture […] that re­appear in every kind of hall. These include a heavy hall-table and a settle. […] English round gate-legged tables are very popular as hall-­ tables. […] In smaller halls, there will be merely sev­eral wooden chairs and a wooden settle.”3 Mies’ use of a “general space” of the kind described here by Hermann Muthesius does not necessarily imply that he was aware of this text, or that it was a creation of his own devices: by then this arrangement had become an established pattern – a typology of sorts.

Although this central space was rather austere, especially when the doors were closed, it was also spacious, a quality that Muthesius deemed characteristic for this type of room. By arranging the space so that it opens directly onto the loggia with a panoramic view of the lake and the woodland beyond, the hall is transformed into an architectural set-piece. On entering the room, visitors initially face the stairs, but a change in direction toward the light ensures that one only sees the first few steps. A door on the landing signals unequivocally that what lies behind is private.

The floor plan of the house is organised in such a way that, when the doors are open, one can see outside from this central hall in several directions. A company of guests seated at the din­ ing table would each have a view outdoors wherever they sat, and all the visual axes cross in a star-shape at the centre of the room.

All of this lends the building as a whole an extremely open impression. Two alcoves adjoining the hall can be separated off by curtains, creating different situations: one more intimate and one more open. The same opposition can also be seen in the different faces of the house: the introverted side facing the street and the extroverted side facing the private garden.

Ground floor plan

Views from the street

17

Later alterations to the building The house was renovated in 2001.4 The garden wall, balcony, flat tile roofing and chimney are all reconstructions. The enclosure of the loggia with perimeter glazing, which had been undertaken at an earlier date, was retained and the original condition was not reinstated. The original enclosed staircase and dumb waiter was replaced with an open staircase and the entrance door was changed. Most of the original fittings, with the exception of a few elements in the attic, have also been lost. As the original planning records and working drawings no longer exist and the published plans are idealised plans that differ from the building survey, it is not possible to conclusively determine the original plans of the lower floor and attic.

The building as seen from the present This “general space” that Mies created right at the beginning of his career marks the first use of what Mies would later term “universal space”: an architecture independent of a specific function. As he explained, “I have always liked large rooms in which I can do as I please […]. I said: ‘Make your spaces big enough, man, so that you can walk around in them freely, and not just in one predetermined direction!’ […] We don’t know at all whether people will do with them what we expect them to. Functions are not so clear or so constant; they change faster than the building.”5 Mies had evidently wished to achieve precisely this spatial constellation and precisely these proportions. The ratio of the width to length of the hall is 2:3, as is the ratio of the height to width. The alcoves adjoining the hall have the same proportions, as does the entrance vestibule and the windows and opening onto the loggia.

From his later buildings, we know that Mies never left the proportions to chance, declaring that “the artistic expresses itself in the proportions”.6 His floor plan, however, could only be achieved with considerable constructional effort, as the spatial disposition conflicted with the structure of the building. The dimensions and orientation of the hall could only be achieved without the use of columns by employing a concealed supporting construction. Hidden columns bear a hidden I-beam on which the transverse gable wall of the upper storey rests. This expensive supplementary construction shows how far Mies was from his later ideal of structural clarity. But it also shows how uncompromisingly he wished to realise this particular plan within the confines of this unassuming building type.

The Riehl House can also be analysed according to Gottfried Semper’s theory of the four elements of architecture. In the nineteenth century, Semper characterised architecture according to four primordial elements – hearth, roof, enclosure and mound – each of which he related to a specific material. In the Riehl House, the hearth is related to the materials metal and ceramics out of which the “fireplace” is made. Although this is actually just a radiator screen, its altar-like treatment and placement lend it the status of a fireplace. With regard to the enclosure, Semper noted that “the word Wand [wall] has the same root as Gewand [garment]. They describe the textile or fabric of the walls that clothe the space.”7 Even when walls were later made of masonry, panelled with wood or clad with sheets of marble, Semper argued that they still represented a non-structural enclosure that derived from the textile fabric of old. Although only visible in the tectonic articulation, and only hinted at discreetly, the principle of the sep­­ aration of structure from non-structural infill is visible in the fine profiling of the pilasters of the façade. On the garden frontage, these infill panels are actually omitted in a manner akin to a halftimbered structure. Finally, this elemental approach to the building design is most apparent in its relationship to the topography: the building is firmly anchored with the site by a substantial mound.

18

1 From a conversation with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in the documentary film “Mies van der Rohe” by Georgia van der Rohe, 1986.

2 Hermann Muthesius, Das Englische Haus, Berlin 1904, vol. 3 (English-language edition: Hermann Muthesius, The English House. Volume III: The Interior, London 2007).

3 Ibid., pp. 170–173.

4 The house was renovated by the architects Heiko Folkerts together with conservation consulting from Jörg Limberg. See the contribution by Folkerts and Limberg in: Johannes Cramer and Dorothée Sack (eds.), Mies van der Rohe: Frühe Bauten – Probleme der Erhaltung – Probleme der Bewertung, Petersberg 2004, pp. 27–55.

5 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in conversation with Ulrich Conrads in 1964, produced on a phonograph record, Mies in Berlin, Bauwelt, Berlin 1966.

6 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Manuscript of a “radio broadcast” on 17 Aug. 1931, in: Fritz Neumeyer, The Artless Word – Mies van der Rohe on the Building Art, Cambridge, Mass. 1991, p. 311.

7 Gottfried Semper, Die vier Elemente der Baukunst, Braunschweig 1851, p. 57 (The Four Elements of Architecture, Cambridge, Mass. 2011).

Bird‘s eye view

riehl House

19

Perls House Berlin-Zehlendorf, Germany, 1911–12

Although the house takes the form of a decidedly compact block, its design is dictated by a desire to relate the interior to the garden. The straightforward and unassuming impression one has of the building from the street belies the complexity of the circulation within and the many-layered system of visual axes that connect the indoors with outdoors.

A curved recess in the garden fence serves as an inviting gesture, drawing the visitor through the gate and directing them toward the asymmetrically placed entrance to the house. Although the entrance vestibule is located in the corner of the building – like the house itself in the north corner of the site –, one has views from this first room in all directions. Several visual axes pass through the house and cross at the point where the visitor’s route into the house divides, one way leading on to the representative rooms, the other to the private areas. When the doors are open, one has a view from this point in the entrance hall of the entire ground floor with views beyond into the garden. Adjoining the study of the house’s owner, a lawyer and art collector, is the central dining room with a long room for making music beyond.

In the plan, a further rounded element, the bottom step of the stairs, serves as a similar inviting gesture encouraging people to move through the house.

Mies, then 25 years of age and working in Peter Behren’s architecture office, told the client, who was the same age as him, that, “The architect must get to know the people who will live in the planned house. From their needs, the rest inevitably follows. Of course, in addition to the wishes of the client, the position, orientation and size of the plot also play an important role in determin­ ing the final plan of the house. The ‘where’ and ‘how’ of the exterior then follows naturally from all of that.”1 As the building was to house a collection of artworks, the rooms of the ground floor have a representative character while the bedrooms and child’s room, as well as the bathroom, closet and guest rooms, are located on the upper floor. The lower ground, which opens onto a narrow yard to the north, houses the kitchen, washroom and a “maid’s room”. Thanks to a steep slope, the two-storey building appears as if it has three storeys on the north side.

The clear proportions of the rooms in the interior are reflected in the outdoor areas. The ratio of length to height of the house corresponds to the Golden Section, echoing Karl Friedrich Schinkel’s Altes Museum. Two different gardens, each the same width as the house, are related directly to the building. The first of these is enclosed on three sides by a plant-covered wooden pergola and reached directly from the loggia, itself a transitional zone extending deep into the building. The second part of the garden, a sunken rectangular court, also relates directly to the façade. Five floor-to-ceiling French windows open extrovertly onto the garden presenting a panoramic view of the surroundings. A single step leads from the house into the garden, and from there a small stair on into the sunken garden terrace. A figurative sculpture was placed in the garden, its position – as marked in the plans of the garden – aligning with the main axis of the house. The sculpture marks the end of this axis and helps to maximise the spacious impression of this otherwise modest-sized house.

Later alterations to the building The house as it exists today represents a partial reconstruction ­after significant alterations had been made. The landscaping of the garden was lost and has not been reinstated by the current owner, an anthroposophical school. The house first changed hands not long after its completion. Hugo Perls, a lawyer, art historian and later a Plato scholar, gave the house in exchange for five paintings by Max Liebermann to Eduard Fuchs, a founder member of the communist party and also an art collector. Between 1927 and 1928, Fuchs added a gallery wing, also designed by Mies, but was forced to flee Germany five years later when his house, along with his

20

First floor plan Ground floor plan View from the garden

Garden faรงade

21

22

Loggia from the garden Loggia

notable collection of erotic art, was seized by the SS. After years of dereliction, the house was converted under the direction of Albert Speer into a secret facility for the production of instruments and gauges for retaliatory weapons (V-rockets). After the war, the company continued to flourish producing technical medical equipment from the house until the end of the 1970s.

The windows and doors were changed and the loggia was closed off. Extensions were built, encasing the original building like a second skin. A single photograph remains of the house directly after its completion showing an idealised view from a perspective that matched Mies’ own presentation drawings and echoed those of Schinkel. Dietrich von Beulwitz, who was entrusted with the ren­ ovation, relied heavily on recollections of the building by Philip Johnson, who had studied the building intensively before the alterations were undertaken and was able to describe the original tones of colour used.2 Von Beulwitz described the difficulties he had because “modern plaster and paint, all industrial products, are quite different from the old materials.” The building was originally rendered with a “plaster of slaked lime” and “a lime paint put on ‘al fresco’ and combining with the plaster, rubbing off slightly over the course of time and giving a particularly lively effect.”3

that provide an indication of the original condition of the building. For further information on the renovation, see: Dietrich von Beulwitz, “The Perls House by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe” in: Architectural Design, vol. 11/12, 1983.

3 Ibid, p. 63.

4 Cf. Philip Johnson 1947, p. 14; Blake 1960, p. 160; Spaeth 1985, p. 22.

5 Fritz Neumeyer, “Space for Reflection: Block versus Pavilion”, in: Franz Schulze (ed.), Mies van der Rohe – Critical Essays, New York 1989, pp.

164–165.

The building as seen from the present The entire design hinges around the position of the dining table in the geometric centre of the house. It is at this central point that the two primary axes that connect the house and garden intersect at right angles to one another, and where other, diagonal sight lines cross before continuing on into the greenery outside.

This star-shaped constellation of axes affords a panoramic view of the natural surroundings, uniting indoor and outdoor space in a single spatial concept. The compact form of the house exhibits a sparing sobriety and geometric rigour that is also to be found in the proportion of the rooms. The central room around the din­ ing table has the proportions 2:3, extending to become almost a square when the windows to the loggia are opened. This tension between the building’s geometric precision and expansive sense of space informs the character of the building.

After a long period in which the house was accorded little attention by scholars of Mies, with the exception of repeated refer­ ences to the influence of Schinkel,4 it was eventually recognised as containing early indications of characteristics that were to develop in Mies’ later work. For Fritz Neumeyer, one particular detail reveals one of Mies’ central themes: the expression of a clear and rational construction. Slots, one centimetre thick, are cut into the side walls of the loggia, articulating the corners visually as loadbearing columns. “This small detail indicates the autonomy of the tectonic skeleton,”5 argued Neumeyer, introducing a further interpretation of the building: the loggia could be read as a pergola that has been inserted into the building.

The loggia has a pivotal function. As a transitional space, it links indoors with outdoors. It is part of the house when seen as an extension of the interior, and part of the garden when regarded as a continuation of the pergola that encompasses the outdoor space.

The transition between indoors and outdoors is articulated both through the precise placement of the openings as well as the continuous step from the music room to the garden. Although very discreet, this detail, in combination with the other steps leading down to the sunken court with the sculpture, lends the passage of movement a noticeable sense of descent. This in turn creates the impression that the house rests on a raised podium. In his later works, Mies also positioned sculptures outdoors in such a way that they relate to the interior, heightening its impression of space.

1 As recalled by Hugo Perls in: Warum ist Kamilla schön? Von Kunst, Künstlern und Kunsthandel, Munich 1962, p. 16.

2 Von Beulwitz assembled a collection of all the documents he could find

perls Ho use

23

Kröller-Müller House, Façade Mock-up Wassenaar, Netherlands, 1912–13 destroyed

1

2

4

3

8

5

6

1 Vestibule 2 Hall 3 Dining room 4 Corridor 5 Pergola 6 Water basin 7 Lady’s living quarters 8 Gallery 9 Garden with small pond 10 Greenhouse

24

Elevation Ground floor plan

7

9

10

On a coastal site on the Dutch North Sea coast, a full-scale mockup of the façades of a house, constructed of painted sailcloth over wood framing, was erected in winter 1912/13 between the dunes and woods. The only known photograph of the installation was published 15 years later in an article, accompanied by the note: “Mies was quite right when he remarked on this project that if one were to remove the detailing of the façade, one would have a building very much like those he makes today. That is, a building in which living is not dictated by the arrangement of the house, but the arrangement of the house follows the process of living.”1 The original floor plan no longer exists, but Mies later sketched a sequence of some of the spaces from memory. 2 He placed the entrance at the corner of the H-shaped plan of the building.

Visitors pass through a vestibule into a representative hall from which a path leads to the dining room and a long passage to a second wing with a large exhibition gallery. In this second wing on the far side, a hall also serves as a vestibule distributing the visitors in all directions.

The lady of the house, Helene Kröller-Müller, had specific ideas of her own for a monumental country house. To exhibit their collection of paintings, a windowless hall was required that she wanted placed near to her own room.3 The organisation of the programme of spaces was complex as the different functional areas needed to be independent of one another but still be incorporated into an overall composition. The different areas included a succession of reception rooms for entertaining, the private residence of the couple, a service wing for the servants as well as semi-public areas for the art collection. This programme of spaces, representing the different living processes, was recorded by Peter Behrens, who was originally commissioned to undertake the project. His design was also tested on site as a fullscale model but was ultimately turned down. Mies worked at the time as Behrens’ assistant and was able to establish a good work­ ing relationship with the clients. Mies was then asked to develop a design of his own for the house, which in turn marked the end of his collaboration with Behrens.

In Behrens’ earlier project, visitors were also led via a vestibule into a hall from which a corridor continued onto the far wing with the windowless gallery space. The living room, “in which the family usually dined, as is typical in Holland,”4 is axially aligned with a pool of water in front of it while the dining room was used only for special events or entertaining guests. The wing with the succession of reception rooms is divided into two linear zones, one for the service functions and one for the served rooms. The kitchen was situated on the upper storey. Fritz Hoeber wrote of the lady’s rooms: “The square of the gentleman’s room at one end corresponds to a large vestibule at the other end from which the lady’s personal living quarters can be reached. Her living room, replete with a special wardrobe, can only be reached through this room; there is no door directly from the hallway. And to continue this analogy with a monastic cell, the lady’s living room has its own private garden, its ‘giardino secreto’ in an intimate courtyard whose short sides are flanked by freestanding columns, affording an expansive view from the windows of her room while still providing a sense of enclosure.”5 Mies carried over this arrangement of the garden into his own project, flanking it with a greenhouse, and likewise attributing it to the lady’s quarters.6 He heightened its sense of intimacy by making only one room open onto the garden. We know from rec­ ords that Helene Kröller-Müller had found Behrens’ architecture to be lacking in intimacy.7 One can only speculate as to why Mies’ design was eventually rejected. While Mies was developing his design, Hendrik Petrus Berlage was also commissioned to draw up a second design.

The Kröller-Müllers consulted their artistic advisor, who is reported to have said of Berlage’s project, “that is art,” and of Mies’,

25

26

Elevation Upper floor plan

“that is not.” However, Berlage’s project also never came to fruition. Mies even went to Paris to solicit a critique of his own design from the art critic Julius Meier-Graefe, who wrote in praise of the “handsome asymmetrical arrangement” of the complex, declaring: “Nothing is piecemeal. All the parts hang together and are developed logically.”8 Later alterations to the building The 1:1 model of the house was set up on a system of rails so that it could be moved about. “Everything inside – the partitions and the ceilings – could move up and down,”9 recalled Mies, noting in retrospect that it could be dangerous to erect a house as a model.

The building as seen from the present In his use of the term “dangerous”, Mies was probably referring to the fact that there is more to building than erecting a life-size impression of its form. Even when one can experience its spatial characteristics, it lacks all materiality and the specifics of its construction, as well as a connection with the place. Rem Koolhaas on the other hand has written in S,M,L,XL: “I suddenly saw him inside the colossal volume, a cubic tent vastly lighter and more suggestive than the sombre and classical architecture it attempted to embody. I guessed – almost with envy – that this strange ‘enactment’ of a future house had drastically changed him: were its whiteness and weightlessness an overwhelming revelation of everything he did not yet believe in? An epiphany of anti-matter? Was this canvas cathedral an acute flash-forward to another architecture?”10 The development of Mies’ work would nevertheless display an evolutionary continuity for a long time to come. Leaving aside the rigorous classical arrangement of the façades, the way in which the secondary volumes interlock “organically” with the primary block-like building volume already hints at his later work. Mies would later say of this project: “Certainly I was influenced by Schinkel, but the plan is not in any way Schinkel’s.”11 A water basin was to be placed in front of the expansive complex in which the architecture would be reflected, a situation comparable to that seen in the Barcelona Pavilion, for here too a sec­ ond smaller pool was planned within a more intimate en­closed courtyard to reflect a sculptural figure.

A smaller model was also constructed of Mies’ project but in a modified form. In this model, the intimate courtyard with the smaller pool and a sculpture on a round plinth is open on the other side. The central space, which corresponds to the lady’s room in Behrens’ project, no longer has three large French windows opening onto the garden but is now puzzlingly entirely enclosed and is marked as a gallery for engravings.12 1 Paul Westheim, “Mies van der Rohe – Entwicklung eines Architekten”, in: Das Kunstblatt, vol. 2, 1927, p. 56.

2 Sketch of the Ground floor plan from around 1931. Published in: Barry Bergdoll and Terence Riley (eds.), Mies in Berlin. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

Die Berliner Jahre 1907–1938, Munich 2001, p. 166.

3 Cf. Sergio Polano, “Rose-shaped, Like an Open Hand. Helene KröllerMüller’s House”, in: Rassegna, Dec. 1993, p. 23.

4 Fritz Hoeber, Peter Behrens, Munich 1913, p. 201.

5 Ibid., pp. 201–202.

6 Cf. Mies’ legend “House of flowers for the lady”.

7 Cf. note 3.

8 The letter from Julius Meier-Graefe can be found in the MoMA Archives.

Cited in: Franz Schulze and Edward Windhorst, Mies van der Rohe – A Critical Biography, Chicago 2012, pp. 41–42.

9 Mies van der Rohe in conversation with Henry Thomas Cadbury-Brown in: Architectural Association Journal, July/Aug. 1959, p. 29.

10 Rem Koolhaas, S,M,L,XL, Rotterdam 1995, p. 63.

11 Cf. note 9, p. 28.

12 Cf. note 2.

Kröller-Müller Ho use , Fa ç ade M o ck - up

27

Werner House Berlin-Zehlendorf, Germany, 1912–13

On a site directly adjacent to the Perls House, Mies designed a second L-shaped building made up of a constellation of differ­ ent building volumes. The building is placed at the north end of a large site, turning its back on its neighbour to the north, while the southern part of the site is kept free for use as a vegetable garden. As with the earlier houses for Riehl and Perls, the façade facing the garden is more open and monumental than the street elevation and features a central frontal projection emphasising the symmetry of the garden elevation. From the north, by contrast, one sees only a wall that conceals the service yard and the windows closest to the street are the kitchen windows. With this gesture the house turns away from the street and opens onto the private outdoor areas.

Stylistically, the stuccoed building with a large mansard roof follows a regional building pattern reminiscent of that used by ­Alfred Messel for similar buildings, as and described by Paul ­Mebes in his book Um 1800.1 This stylistic direction emphasises simplicity over the prestige of classicism. The plan of the house ­bears­­similarity to that of Peter Behrens’ Wiegand House, especially the pergola that extends out into the garden, but its character is less monumental: its dimensions are more modest and the atmosphere more intimate.

The path from the street to the main entrance ascends a couple of steps to a raised podium. All these elements – the path, steps and podium – are paved with brick. From the entrance, the path through the house does not lead in a straight line to the garden but towards a radiator concealed by a radiator screen that shares the same detailing as those in the Perls House, with alternating square-section and round-section bars that have been given a slight entasis much like classical columns. Elsewhere, the decorative details have been handled sparingly, with just the suggestion of a capital on the columns of the pergola and a heavily ab­ stracted eaves cornice detail.

On stepping out into the garden, one enters a further architectonically defined space. Here the commingling of architecture and the plot’s topography is more strongly articulated than in Mies’ earlier buildings. In this L-shaped complex, the architecture and the garden are likewise conceived as a whole. Like the Perls House next door, the house opens onto a sunken garden area except that here it is enclosed by a walkway, which takes the form of a colonnaded structure. In his earlier design for the Kröller-Müller House, Mies describes a similar construction as a “pergola”, however these are less like open structures than roofed-over sections of the building complex.

The garden at the rear – a terrace with rough-hewn stone paving – is accessed, like in the Wiegand House, via three French doors in the central, axially-arranged room, as well as from the neighbouring dining room that opens directly onto the pergola.

Again echoing the arrangement of the Wiegand House, the garden is divided into different conceptual areas: a formal, geo­ metrically defined area that relates directly to the architecture, and a landscaped garden area. The path through the architecture is articulated to provide framed views and leads up two sets of stone steps to a wooded area from which one has a view of the entire ensemble.

Later alterations to the building The addition of a later extension over the former service yard alter­ed the appearance of the building ensemble. Built in the 1920s, the extension continues the formal language of the building but changes its shape. The garden has also been changed: the straight rear retaining wall has been replaced by a wall with a semi-circular recess.2 The pool of water in the lower section is likewise a later addition, replacing a bed of herbaceous plants. The pergola has also been lengthened to accommodate a wheelchair access ramp and a school now uses the building.

28

Ground floor plan

Garden Stairs in the garden

29

The building as seen from the present Although the reconstruction replicates just the gesture of an outstretched arm enclosing the garden, and does not follow Mies’ original concept, it still allows us to experience the unity of build­ ing and garden in Mies’ work more powerfully than any other of his early works, and one can still sense the intimacy of the atmosphere. While the topography of the garden is “constructed” as a series of plateaus connected by steps, the building has in turn become overgrown.

Before Mies’ next building – the Warnholtz House – was discovered by historians, the Werner House was held to be an isolated exception in his oeuvre of works, so much so that his authorship was called into question.3 But it is less the formal and stylistic language that makes this building notable than the structural concept of the ensemble. Mies’ design builds on an established build­ ing type, and he would later declare the idea of the simple and self-evident to be an ideal, but what makes this building relevant is its definition of space through the volume of the building. The right-angular form creates a protected courtyard situation, a principle that Mies also employed for the design of his own house, al­ though this was never built. In his later addition to the Perls House he would likewise create an L-shaped situation, demonstrating that the pattern of living does not have to follow the arrangement of the house but vice versa. But Mies had not dispensed with the simplicity and rigour of his clearly proportioned rectangular floor plans. The different floor plans of the Perls House and the Werner House represent two conceptual poles between which he would experiment in his future work. In retrospect, his entire European oeuvre can be seen as an attempt to bring contrasting conceptions into harmonious balance. Of this period he would later say, “After my time in Holland, an inner battle ensued in which I tried to free myself from the influence of Schinkelesque classicism.”4 The origins of the L-shaped arrangement go back to the Kröller-Müller project. In Behrens’ earlier design for the building, which Mies had worked on, the lady’s quarters were connected to an intimate garden, a concept that Mies also carried over for his own design for that house and finally put into practice in a similar form here in the Werner House.

1 Paul Mebes, Um 1800, Munich 1908. In a conversation with Dirk Lohan, Mies cites Alfred Messel’s Villa Oppenheim in Berlin as one of his inspirations. Documented in a manuscript in the Mies Archives of the MoMA, New York.

2 For further information on the design of the garden, see Christiane Kruse, Garten, Natur und Landschaftsprospekt – Zur ästhetischen Inszenierung des Außenraums in den Landhausanlagen Mies van der Rohes, Dissertation, Freie Universität Berlin 1994.

3 The plans of the house are signed only by Ferdinand Goebbels, who was Mies’ partner and was also involved in executing the Perls House. Since then a further plan signed by Mies has been discovered. See also Christiane Kruse, “Haus Werner – Ein ungeliebtes Frühwerk Mies van der Rohes”, in: Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 1993, pp. 554–563.

4 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in conversation with Ulrich Conrads in 1964, produced on a phonograph record, “Mies in Berlin”, Bauwelt, Berlin 1966.

30

Pergola Stairs to entrance Radiator screen

Garden faรงade

Werner Ho use

31

Warnholtz HOUSE Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany, 1914–15 destroyed

This house on the Heerstraße, which was only attributed to Mies in 20011, continues the formal language of the Werner House. Visitors pass by the shortest possible path through the house along a central axis. A central salon is flanked to the west by a music room and dining room, and to the east by a library and study. The clear proportions of the rooms are a product of their round dimensions: the salon measures exactly 5 by 7.50 metres, the entrance 3 by 4 metres, the closed veranda to the west 4 by 5 metres and the li­ br­a­­­ry 4 by 3 metres.2 A second transverse axis offers views perpendicular to the main axis, creating a maximum sense of breadth.

Mies’ declared admiration for Alfred Messel, and for his design of the Oppenheim House in particular, can be seen in the detailing of the façade as well as the design of the open veranda. The house was demolished around 1960 and the garden destroyed.

1 Markus Jager, “Das Haus Warnholtz von Mies van der Rohe (1914/15)”, in: Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 2002, pp. 123–136. The design of the garden has been reconstructed from historical aerial photographs. With thanks to Markus Jager for his valuable input.

2 These dimensions are given in the building records at the Berlin Landesarchiv.

32

Elevation Ground floor plan

urbig House Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1915–17

The design for this villa exploits the topography of the sloping site on the banks of Griebnitzsee lake in such a way that it presents two storeys on one side and three on the other. As with the Warnholtz House, a succession of stairs leads from the living area via a terrace down to the garden. A further open staircase next to the house leads to a small seating area. The terrace is articulated as a podium and appears to extend through the entire house, reappearing on the street elevation as a large travertine step and giving the impression that the house rests on a plinth. The travertine paving of the terrace has since been reconstructed, as have the balustrades, window shutters and garden fence. The access to the lower storey has also been changed. The boathouse was demolished in 1961 when the Berlin wall was built, which passed through the garden.1 1 Further information on the history of its use and restoration, see: Winfried Brenne, “Haus Urbig, Neubabelsberg. Baugeschichte und Wiederherstellung”, in: Johannes Cramer and Dorothée Sack (eds.), Mies van der Rohe: Frühe Bauten. Probleme der Erhaltung, Probleme der Bewertung, Petersberg 2004, ­pp. 62–70; as well as: Claudia Hain, Villa Urbig 1915–1917 – Zur Geschichte und Architektur des bürgerlichen Wohnhauses für den Bankdirektor Franz Urbig –­Ein frühes Werk von Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in PotsdamBabelsberg, Berlin 2009, private print. This contains a print of the plan of the boathouse signed by Mies.

Ground floor plan

33

Greenwald House Weston, Connecticut, USA, 1951–56

The house is based on the same principle as the McCormick House, placing a single-storey of the Lake Shore Drive Apartments at ground level into the landscape. In fact, the house’s façade is made of actual unused elements of the high-rise building’s façade.

The entrance leads directly into the central living room, which is flanked on either side by two wood-panelled service cores. Next to the entrance is a freestanding storage cabinet that serves as a divider screening off the bedroom. A second entrance leads directly into the kitchen. A low wall of rough-hewn stone creates a step in the terrain allowing the surrounding woodland to be appreciated from a podium. The house, built for the brother of Herbert Greenwald, Mies’ most important client at the time, was extended in 1959–60 by two bays according to plans by Mies’ office. Later, a further extension and pavilions were added that are grouped around the building.1 The interior was also subsequently altered.

1 For further information on the alterations and additions, see: Paul Gold­ berger, “Modifying Mies – Peter L. Gluck Rises to the Modernist’s Challenge”, in: Architectural Digest, vol. 2, 1992, pp. 72–82.

160

Exterior view Interior Floor plan

Commonwealth Promenade Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1953–57

Of the four towers originally planned, only the southern pair was completed. A covered walkway connects the towers with one an­ other and extends out into the neighbouring Lincoln Park. The detailing of the aluminium curtain walling is identical to that of the Esplanade Apartments constructed at the same time. Pivoting sections in the lower part of the window provide ventilation and incorporate a fly screen in the plane of the glazing. Compared­ with the buildings on 860–880 Lake Shore Drive, the concrete con­struction used here made it possible to incorporate an ­extra storey within the same overall building height. In contrast to the standard I-beam sections applied to the exterior of the Lake Shore Drive Apartments, the aluminium profiles used here were develop­ ­ed ­especially for the curtain wall façade. The more pronounced thermal expansion of aluminium, however, made it necessary to include expansion joints that interrupt the continuity of the vertic­ ­al lines at each storey.

For Reyner Banham the use of a more lightweight material represented a technical advancement: “It is a material, where a large order implies the ability to name your sections […] a choice of section is as natural in aluminium as is the absence of choice in steel, where the economics of rolling-mill manufacture still make fancy sections pretty well impossible.”1 As a propon­ent of actively employing technical advancements in architecture, Banham regarded the possibilities of detailing with aluminium as “far more elaborate”.

1 Reyner Banham, “Almost Nothing is Too Much”, in: Architectural Review, Aug. 1962, p. 128.

Site plan South façade Window detail

161

Esplanade Apartments Chicago, Illinois, USA, 1953–57

The two apartment buildings at 900–910 Lake Shore Drive contin­ue Mies’ series of lakeside buildings. On a site immediately north of the existing towers at 860–880 Lake Shore Drive, Mies planned two further high-rise buildings that adhere to the same urban concept: the buildings are placed as freestanding elements in space and do not align with the massing of the historical urban grain of the city. While the Esplanade apartment buildings also stand on a trapezoidal site, the two buildings are not identical in size. The southernmost of the two buildings is shaped like a monumental slab and the two buildings are placed closer to each other than their counterparts at 860–880. Mies’ client, Herbert Greenwald, paid the highest amount ever paid at that time for a site for residential use in Chicago.1 The consequent need to make optimal use of the site was achieved by significantly increasing the size of the building vol­ umes and by reducing the storey height. A new design for the ceil­ ing construction made it possible to reduce the structural height of the ceilings. This made it possible to incorporate three additional storeys and at the same time to slightly reduce the overall height of the building. Although the fundamental concept of the buildings – that of fully glazed rectangular prisms – is identical to that of their predecessors, technical advances in the few years between the buildings’ construction meant that the construction and the materials used changed. While the buildings at 860–880 were prototypes, the Esplanade Apartments are optimised both technologically as well as economically.

The problems revealed by the prototypes were tackled in the second pair of buildings not only by making modifications in detail but also through the choice of a different material. The structural frame is again completely fronted by a glazed skin, but this time the façade is made of anodized aluminium mounted on a concrete frame. The façade itself is articulated as a curtain wall construction, this time with continuous, equally-sized large windows.

To resolve the overheating experienced in the earlier buildings, tinted panes and air-conditioning were installed.

While the construction was previously left exposed on the façade, the reinforced concrete columns are now set back from the edge of the building to provide a cavity between the columns and the external skin for air-conditioning. The dark grey tint of the glaz­ ing heightens the impression of the curtain wall as an independent element and emphasises the volumetric sculptural quality of the building. For the characteristic vertical mullions applied to the out­er face of the façade, a custom extrusion made of a ­ luminium was now used instead of the continuous lines of steel I-beams used at 860–880, which were made of two standard T-profiles welded together. Because aluminium is more susceptible to thermal expansion than steel, the mullions are separated by small gaps at each storey to accommodate thermal expansion.

A low-lying building was constructed to house a car park with a flat roof that served as a communal sun deck. This however, compromises the expansive sense of space at ground level that characterises the earlier buildings as well as the transition from outdoors to indoors, achieved in the earlier building by using continuous uniform travertine paving. The entrance lobby is instead paved with terrazzo flooring while the inner core is clad with marble. The glaz­ ing at ground floor level is partially transparent and partially translucent, transforming the walls into illuminated objects at night. Unlike the buildings at 860–880, lamella can be seen beneath the first floor ceiling that serve as vents for the air-conditioning.

Later alterations to the building After the transfer of the apartments into private ownership at the end of the 1970s, many residents made alterations to their apartments, some combining several units into one. The building’s design was, however, conceived to accommodate this kind of flexibility. Since then, the building has been extensively renovated.

162

Site plan

860–880 Lake Shore Drive and Esplanade Apartments

163

164

View from the northeast Walkway between the buildings

The building as seen from the present The concept of curtain wall construction as an independent layer hung in front of the loadbearing structure was not only pioneering for Mies’ own work but has shaped the construction of high-rise buildings to the present day. Likewise, the experimental use of aluminium as a building material has also become common practice, especially for the façades of high-rise buildings.

Although the Esplanade Apartments lack some of the conceptual clarity and heroic spirit of the towers at 860–880, and are consequently not as famous architecturally as their predecessors, the apartments they contain are more expensive. Despite lacking the minimalist clarity of the earlier buildings, the apartments still enjoy spectacular panoramic views over Lake Michigan and are appointed to a higher technical standard, including better lifts. As such, the apartments have lost none of their original attraction.

1 This was not, however, the only record it broke: “Esplanade was the tall­ est concrete building yet constructed in Chicago, and the first with a flatslab concrete frame. It boasted the city’s first central air-conditioning for a residential tower; one of the first unitized, anodized aluminium curtain walls; and Chicago’s first large-scale use of tinted, heat-absorbing glass.” Franz Schulze and Edward Windhorst, Mies van der Rohe: A Critical Biography, Chicago 2012, p. 294.

Exterior view

Esplanade A partments

165

Seagram Building New York, USA, 1954–58

166

Ground floor plan

View from the southwest

167

The slender office tower has a monumental presence on New York’s prestigious Park Avenue. Although the pristine prismatic volume of the building is enveloped by a grid of identical windows, the build­ ing exhibits a tripartite structure in the classical manner: a base zone is formed by raising the building off the ground on columns and creating a glazed entrance lobby, and the shaft of the building is crowned by an opaque section housing the technical services.

The office tower is set back from the street by about 30 metres to form an urban plaza, creating a rare open space in the densely built urban fabric of midtown New York. While most build­ings in Manhattan typically fill the entire block creating a contin­uous line of frontages along the street, the setting back of the tower makes it appear like a solitary object when approached from the plaza. Although the building is also stepped and adheres to the block pattern, it presents itself as a freestanding object. On the reverse side, it steps back and aligns with the New York pattern of streets and blocks, which even landmarks in the skyline such as the Empire State Building or the Chrysler Build­ ing were obliged to do.

The plaza is so vital to the project that Mies saw it endanger­ed when the client briefly considered placing a bank building on the plaza.1 Paved with granite slabs, containing two shallow pools and flanked by marble bench-like blocks, the plaza represents an essential part of the architecture, functioning as a podium that visitors must cross before they pass through the columns of the entrance lobby. Raised a few steps above the street, the plaza forms a plinth akin to that of a Greek temple and denotes a space set apart from the hustle and bustle of the sidewalk.

While the loadbearing structure of the building is steel, the hung curtain wall façade is made of bronze. The bronze tint of the glazing lends the skin of the building a sense of unity. The building employs the same principle of externally applied vertical I-beam mullions that Mies used in his Chicago high-rise build­ ings, however here the mullion profiles as well as the glazing have been custom-fabricated. The wide-flange H-shaped form of the profiles was arrived at through innumerable tests because of what Mies described as its precise interplay of “umbra and penumbra”.2 The delicate relief they lend to the smooth skin of the building causes its appearance to shift as the light changes.

The use of especially high-quality materials in the building defines its character. Before visitors even ascend the steps to the plaza, they come into contact with the green marble blocks.

When asked for his opinion, the client expressed a particular lik­ing for bronze, and in practice this infrequently used alloy of copper and zinc does indeed have advantages over steel and aluminium. Bronze is corrosion-resistant and less susceptible to thermal expansion than aluminium. The bronze façade echoes the underlying structural skeleton and in some sections the panels between the profiles have been filled with panels of green marble rather than panes of glass.

The floor plan is based on a 1.41 metre module and is the product of a combination of ideal office sizes as well as the New York planning laws which stipulated that a tower may occupy a maximum of 25 percent of the floor area of the site. Mies recalls that “since it was to be the first major office building which I was to build, I asked for two types of advice for the development of the plans. One, the best real estate advice as to the types of desirable rental space and, two, professional advice regarding the New York City Building Code.”3 To execute the building, Mies entered into a cooperation with Philip Johnson, about whom Phyllis Lambert, the director of ­p lanning, wrote: “Knowing that Mies’ primary concern was the articulation of structure, form, and material, Philip quickly grasp­ed that Seagram presented an unusual opportunity to improve on many of the standard industrial design elements used in office buildings: doors, elevator cabs, hardware, lighting,

168

Views across the plaza Corner detail

View from the northeast Entrance lobby

Seagram B uilding

169

plumbing fixtures, and room partitions, as well as lettering and signage […] eventually expanding to include the design of entire office floors, lighting strategies for the whole building. […] Philip used power­ful theatrical effects.” 4 He designed the interiors such as The Four Seasons restaurant and, together with the lighting ­planner Richard Kelly, the design of the continuous illuminated ceilings that at night turned the building into a luminous object.

Later alterations to the building The complex has remained largely unchanged to the present day.

The planting of weeping willows on the plaza did not survive and was soon replaced by gingko trees. Conversions works were only undertaken in some of the interiors. In 2000, the architects Diller, Scofidio + Renfro designed a restaurant in the building.

The building as seen from the present Although the building no longer stands as conspicuously as it once did now that the lower-rise buildings in the surroundings have been succeeded by similarly high and abstract towers, the build­ing has lost none of its monumentality. As Mies was design­ing the build­ ing, he had just completed the vast Convention Hall in Chicago which he described as his first building of “really m ­ onumental qual­ ity”.5 Mies’ buildings – like those of Peter Behrens – consistently displayed an immanent sense of monumentality, but Mies was referring here to sheer size: “But, in fact, there is a certain size that is a reality. Take the pyramids in Egypt and make them only 15 feet high. It is nothing. There is just this enormous size that makes all the difference.”6 “As pleasant as the Seagram Building is,” remarked Philip Johnson in 1978, “it’s still a flat-topped glass box, and that we got a little bit bored with.”7 In retrospect, however, the timeless quality of this building has become ever more apparent, especially in comparison to buildings built over the last few decades.

A particular quality of the Seagram Building is the many different ways in which it reduces its vast scale to that of the pedestrian.

In contrast to the many high-rise tower blocks built since then that offer nothing of benefit to the passer-by, this project created an urban space that continues to be used by the citizens of New York on a daily basis.

1 Phyllis Lambert, Building Seagram, New Haven, London 2013, p. 71.

Phyllis Lambert, daughter of the client Samuel Bronfman, had proposed Mies as the architect and oversaw the project as director of planning.

2 Lambert 2013, p. 62.

3 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in conversation with Cameron Alread and others on 11 May 1960, cited in: Lambert 2013, p. 46.

4 Lambert 2013, pp. 122–123.

5 Ludwig Mies in conversation with Katharine Kuh, in: The Saturday Review, 23 Jan. 1965, p. 22.

6 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in: Moisés Puente (ed.), Conversations with Mies van der Rohe, Barcelona 2006, p. 81.

7 Philip Johnson in conversation with Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel (library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/dsva)

170

Façade details Detail of the lift

View from the southwest

Seagram B uilding

171

Lafayette Park Detroit, Michigan, USA, 1955–58

This essential and comprehensive monograph considers Mies van der Rohe’s built works from a design stand­ point: it reconstructs the buildings as they were built and examines them from a present day perspective, offering the reader new insight into the qualities of the inspiring architecture of a great modern master.

The book presents 80 of Mies’ buildings in chrono lo g­ ical order. Thirty of these works are analysed in greater detail, beginning with a documentation of the build­ ing as it was actually built, followed by an account of later alterations and an analysis of its relevance for a contemporary view of Mies’ work.

All plans and drawings have been redrawn by the author Carsten Krohn who also took all the photographs.

www.birkhauser.com

172

Ground floor plan