Lecture iii post modernism

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III Ar. Hena Tiwari,
GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Post War Decades:
The International Style
Ar. Hena Tiwari
GCAD, Jan-July 2017

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 International Style is the name of a major architectural
style that emerged in 1920s and 1930s.
The formative decades of modern architecture, were
defined by Americans Henry-Russell Hitchcock and Philip
Johnson in 1932.
After World War II the International Style provided an
easily achievable style option for vast-scale urban
development projects.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 It emphasised on :
architectural style,
form and
aesthetics.
 It believed in universality. Thus architecture became
universal and was applicable to all spheres.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 The most common characteristics of International
Style buildings are
i. rectilinear forms;
ii. light, taut plane surfaces that have been completely
stripped of applied ornamentation and decoration;
iii. open interior spaces;
iv. visually weightless quality engendered by the use of
cantilever construction.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
CIAM : regulatory body that was formed for modern
architecture. Corbusier was an active personality.
It was made to satisfy the physical as well as emotional
need in architecture. Thus in that way, good
architecture can enhance the human behavior.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
International Style Origin
Demands were very high, which were to be done
very quickly
They had no time to think about classical or
gothics architecture.
Technology of steel construction evolved.
People became comfortable with the usage and
look of steel and glass.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
It had 2 streams on the Choice of building
materials:
RCC
Steel and glass
The name ‘international style went to
Brazil. SA, Japan through German
architects.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
EMERGENCE OF CORPORATE ARCHITECTURE
After WW corporate houses were anxious about their public
image.
Glass box became the symbol of corporate image.
All corporate houses made in cube style and steel and glass.
Lever House
Seagram’s
Building

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
The international style was striving toward
-Simplification
-Honesty
-Clarification
The idea of style can be summed up in four slogans:
“Ornament is crime”
“Truth to material”
“Form follows function”
“Machines for living”

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
The typical characteristics of International Style
buildings:
• Rectilinear forms;
• plane surfaces that are completely devoid of
applied ornamentation;
• and open, even fluid, interior spaces.
Universality: a building is valid in every region, in
every situation, as a building is reduced to machine.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Architecture to be looked in volumes, not in mass.
Complete rejection to ornamentation
Architecture based on free plan ( decoding the grid)
Skin in bone construction
Light weight construction methods
Synthetic modern materials
Standard modular parts (prefabricated nut bolted at sites)
Cubism inspired forms and facades
Not bothered of past association

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
INTERNATIONAL STYLE
• WALTER GROPIUS
• MIES VAN DER ROHE
• LE CORBUSIER

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
• Walter Gropius belongs to the generation of Mies
Van Der Rohe and Le Corbusier.
• He was the founder and first principle at Bauhaus
• Through the knowledge of arts and industrial
material he created architecture to the need of the
time.
• He pioneered in introducing steel frames, sheet
glass, curtain walls and flat roofs.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Philosophy
“We want to create the purely organic building, boldly
emanating its inner laws, free of untruths or
ornamentation.”
• Architecture has to adapt to the world of machines,
electronics and fast cars.
• Architecture is designed by and individual but
developed with teamwork.
• Architecture isn’t about aesthetic fascination but
reflects a sober pragmatic concern.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
FAGUS FACTORY ,ALFELD, GERMANY
 It was built at alfeld – an– der – leine in 1911.
 Most striking thing: simplicity and confidence of the
architecture.
 In fagus works, Gropius brought the
accomplishment of the past fifteen years.
 It was designed by Gropius keeping in mind the
surroundings.
 It was called by Gropius an artistic and practical
design.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 Fagus building was the first to extract the full
aesthetically revolutionary impact from the
structural development.
 Fagus structure was actually a hybrid construction
of brick columns, steel beams and concrete floor
slabs and stairways.
 It was a steel frame supporting the floors, glass
screen external walls.
 Pillars are set behind the façade so that its curtain
character is fully realized.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Ground floor plan- Fagus shoe factory.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 Glass screen was used all over the walls to have
proper view from inside.
 Walls are no longer supporters of the building but
simple curtain projecting against increment
weather.
 It was domination of voids over solids.
 Plane surfaces predominate in this factory.
 The glass and walls are joined cleanly at the
corners without the intervention of piers.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
FAGUS FACTORY- IINTERNAL
VIEW
FAGUS FACTORY ENTRANCE
EXTERNAL VIEW

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 Modest in scale, the house was revolutionary in
impact.
 Combined the traditional elements of New
England architecture—wood, brick, and
fieldstone—with innovative, including glass
block, acoustical plaster, chrome banisters, and
the latest technology in fixtures.
 Every aspect of the house and its surrounding
landscape was planned for maximum efficiency
and simplicity of design
Gropius House, Lincoln, Massachusetts, 1938

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
MIES VAN DER ROHE
Cullinan Hall
Barcelona Pavilion
Farnsworth House

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 Regarded as One of the Avant –garde architects of
modern architecture
 In Chicago introduced and implemented his new
thoughts- Regarded as II Chicago school
 The buildings of Mies van der Rohe (1886-1969) have
a quality of extreme emptiness, stronger than that
found in other modernist buildings.
 Mies used to say that the source of his architecture
was life and not form. It is possible, therefore, to
interpret this emptiness as renouncing all formal
excess and centering on the service of life itself.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Philosophies:
Beauty is splendor of truth
Building is skin and bone concept
Material and technology effects the building

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Mies explored the relationship between people,
shelter, and nature.
The glass pavilion is raised six feet above a
floodplain next to the Fox River, surrounded by forest
and rural prairies.
Designed and built 1951, Farnsworth House

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Farnsworth House is considered a paradigm of
international style architecture in America.
 The house's structure consists of precast concrete
floor and roof slabs supported by a carefully
crafted steel skeleton frame of beams, girders and
columns.
 The facade is made of single panes of glass
spanning from floor to ceiling, fastened to the
structural system by steel mullions.
 The building is heated by radiant coils set in the
concrete floor; natural cross ventilation and the
shade of nearby trees provide minimal cooling.
 Though it proved difficult to live in, the
Farnsworth House's elegant simplicity is still
regarded as an important accomplishment of the
international style.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
Barcelona Pavilion
Barcelona, 1929

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 Mies understood his pavilion simply as a building
and nothing more, it would not house art or
sculpture rather the pavilion would be a place of
tranquility and escape from the exposition, in effect
transforming the pavilion into an inhabitable
sculpture.
 The pavilion is designed as a proportional
composition where the interior of the pavilion is
juxtaposed to two reflecting pools.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
 One of the most important aspects of the pavilion is
the roof. The low profile of the roof appears in
elevation as a floating plane above the interior
volume.
 In addition to the design, the materials are what
give the Barcelona Pavilion its true architectural
essence as well as the ethereal and experiential
qualities that the pavilion embodies.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
LE CORBUSIER
Space and light and order. Those are the things
that men need just as much as they need bread or
a place to sleep.”
–Le Corbusier
Le Corbusier was a visionary.
He believed that architecture had
lost its way.
Art Nouveau, all curves and
sinuous decorations, had burned
itself out in a brilliant burst of
exuberance.

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GCAD,
Jan-July 2016
DESIGN PHILOSIPHIES
 A house is a machine to live in
 Modular theory
 Urban Concepts
 Furniture
 Brutalism.

Lecture iii post modernism

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Lecture iii post modernism