WALTER ADOLPH GROPIUS

Walter Adolph Gropius was a German American

architect and educator, who founded the Bauhaus.
The Bauhaus was a German art school that became
a seminal force in architecture and applied art
during the first half of the 20th century.
His central thesis, which served as the school's
guiding principle, was that design (in any of its
forms) should be functional, based on a wedding of
art and engineering. This concept, expressed in his
own buildings, had a profound influence on modern
architecture.

Gropius was born in Berlin on May 18, 1883.

He studied architecture in Munich and Berlin-
Carlottenburg.

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 After World War I he became director of two Weimar
art schools. Reorganizing them in 1919 as the
Staatliches Bauhaus (State Building School).
Here students received a basic crafts training to gain
an acquaintance with materials and processes.
This method, which led to a heightened awareness of
the realities of production, virtually revolutionized
modern design.
When the school was moved to Dessau in 1925,
Gropius designed its buildings. They are marked by
simplicity of shape, elimination of surface
decoration, and the extensive use of glass.
1938-52), he introduced the Bauhaus concepts and
helped to shape a generation of American architects.
Gropius died in Boston on July 5, 1969.

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 Gropius introduced a new approach to design
education that emphasized the principle of uniting
art and technology.
He argued for the relative autonomy of fine and
applied art.
He expressed belief in the necessity for reuniting
aesthetic sensibility and utilitarian design. But there
was no mention of the design of types for mass
production .
It seemed as if it had returned to the roots of Arts
and Crafts movement, to William Morris , and to the
belief in handicraft as the sole viable guarantee of
design quality.
He advocated a workshop–based design education for
both design and craftsmen.
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 He discovered the art form of the steel framed
structure
His walls show clearly that they no longer carry and
support the building. Instead the role of the wall was
restricted to mere screens, stretched between the
upright columns of the framework, to keep out rain,
cold and noise.
The use of glass walls presented and unusual
spectacle to eyes accustomed to the supporting wall.
He started the trend towards transparency and
absence of weight.
In the Bauhaus (1925-26), he developed the
organisation of large volumes of space.
Significantly, Gropius derived several of his design
ideas from the European publication of Frank Lloyd
Wright work . the courtyard side of the office block,
for example, relies in the elevation of the Mason city
).
hotel (1909 in Iowa).

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 The Bauhaus - evolution of an idea
An approach to the vexing problem of industrial
production and artistic expression was proposed by
the founding of the Bauhaus.
The Bauhaus was formed by the fusion of two
existing institutions in Weimer: the old Academy of
Fine Arts and School of Applied Arts founded under
Van De Velde in 1906.
It was the outcome of a continuous effort to reform
applied art education in Germany around the turn of
the century.
It was founded with visions of erecting the cathedral
of socialism and the workshops were established in
the manner of cathedral building lodges.
It became a center for artists trying to combine
aesthetic concerns with new industrial materials and
techniques, in what became known as the
International style.
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 The bridging of the gulf between artistic forms and
industrial production was one of the chief motives of
the Bauhaus. They generally advocated simplicity of
form that was adapted to the object's function.
The Bauhaus brought together architects, painters,
and designers…to formulate goals for the modern
age.
It intended to encompass a wide range of creative
works including ceramics, weaving, painting,
architecture.
Parallel with these courses was the Formlehre (study
of form) – instruction in the basis of formal
arrangement, including composition and the study of
colour, texture, and expression .
Eventually these courses were best taught by men
like Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky and Oscar
Schlemmer.
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 His works

The first major project of Gropies and Meyer, the

Fagus shoe last factory at Alfred an der Leine, is
considered a landmark in the history of modern
architecture.
It used elements that later characterized the
International Style.
Glass curtain walls between expressed steel
supports, corners left free of solid masonry, and
simple rectangular massing with a flat roof.
The front façade was windowless and clad with
limestone resembling brick.
Most important was architecture of the
administration block with its transparent staircase,
the glass waalled offices with cotinous round the
corners, and the roof terraces.
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 This exemplary modern work was started in 1926 at
Dessau.
Gropius’s chief aim was to demarcate each element
quite distinctly without isolating one from another,
and at the same time to give an architectural unity
to the whole.
The plan of the building is a pinwheel reaching out
into space like a Mondrian painting.
He expressed elements as rectangular volumes of
varying sizes, linked by oblongs containing corridors
or smaller rooms.
The lightness of the building is emphasized by glass
curtain walls, that are drawn around the corner of
the building.
These glass walls flow into one another precisely at
the point where the human eye is accustomed to see
a supporting column.
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 The interplay of transparency and the piercing the
space by bridges leads to an interpenetration of
horizontal and vertical planes. This makes it possible
to grasp the whole of the complex from any single
viewpoint.
The Bauhaus complex has no definite frontal façade
Gropius varied his fenestration to accentuate the
largeness or smallness of spaces within, and to admit
various qualities of light according to function.
The glass was laid flush with the facade, reinforcing
the overall volumetric character of a space enclosed
by a skin; at times it was recessed accentuating the
hovering white horizontal floor planes.

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 Gropius’s most unequivocal work was his “Total
Theatre” project.
It was largely designed to satisfy the
requirements of a biomechanical stage to
provide the space for ‘theatre of action’.
Walter Gropius realized that the theatre should
create a form of life, which transforms the
passive spectator into active participant.
The auditorium should be kept permanently
illuminated, a permanent visual link thus
maintained between actor and audience.

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 The objective is to create a great and flexible
instrument which can respond in terms of light and
space to every requirement of the theatre producer
giving his imagination a full play
The shape of the theatre is oval, with two
semicircular turntables touching it tangentially .
The theater makes it possible for the actors to play
during the same performance upon a proscenium
stage, apron stage or within a central arena or all
three simultaneously.
The auditorium is supported upon 12 slender
columns.
Screens are stretched between the 12 columns upon
which 12 films can be projected from the cameras
situated behind them.

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 Gropius had taken greater interest in the
prefabrication of houses than any other pioneers of
contemporary architecture.
A new building material was introduced in Germany
ferroconcrete which was applied for larger and
daring structures.
The concept behind prefabrication was that mass
productions methods could be employed which could
be cheaper and result in lower rent.
Gropius produced on the site certain prefabricated
parts, such as standardized beams of reinforced
concrete and cinder blocks for supporting cross walls.

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 Prefabricated housing projects include the
Weissenhof Housing based on dry construction
using light steel framework, with wall panels of
compressed cork covered with sheets of asbestos
cement.
The packaged House System used wood framed
panels which cladding of narrow boards of same
material .
Here every element was based upon the same
module 3 feet 4 inches. The length of the panels
were multiple of this dimension.
These panels could be assembled horizontally or
vertically to form floors, walls, ceilings or roof,
which was possible through four way steel joint or
connector.

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 Gropius was interested in the design of large
complexes rather than individual houses.
A few houses exist, the first of historic
importance being those he designed for
members of teaching staff of the Bauhaus in
1925-26.
There were altogether four buildings: one
detached house for Gropius and three
duplexes (semi detached) for other staff
members.
The special needs of an artist’s dwelling
such as north-facing studio, were also taken
into account: staircase, kitchen, bathroom
facing north and the bedrooms and living
facing south.
The house Gropius built for himself stand on
the crest of a hill in the midst of apple
orchard
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 The structure of the house consists of
traditional light wood frame of England,
sheathed with white painted clapboard
siding.
Rough fieldstone walls, like those
employed in seaside houses.
The big front porch, have given a new
spatial significance.
The projecting canopy, spiral staircase
and wooden trellis break up the compact
solid of the house form.

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 bibliography
Walter Gropius -by Giedion, Sigfried
A World History Of Architecture
Modern Architecture since 1900 -by Curtis, William J.R.
Modern Architecture -by Frampton, Kenneth
Encarta Encyclopedia

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