Bruno Taut’s “Glass Utopia” and the German Werkbund
By Cristina Fernandez
Post WWI Germany- as the Weimar Republic- saw a drastic change not only in the economy, but also in government, art, and architecture. However, one group sought for change even before the war erupted. The German Werkbund, or Work Federation, was formed in 1907 as a reactive response to the idea that rapid industrialization and modernization in Germany posed a threat to the national culture.
The Werkbund itself formed almost immediately after the Jugendstil, which was an art nouveau approach to architecture and decorative arts. The founders, Hermann Muthesius and Henry van de Velde, returned to- and rejected- the ideas of the forerunners of the Arts and Crafts movement by searching for a universal standard that applied to the practice of art and design while maintaining a strong principle in social values. What set it apart from similar associations that formed from this arts and crafts reform movement was its rejection of ‘handicraft romanticism’, an idea favored by most English and Continental cultural critics, and even refused to participate in the collective cultural pessimism in most intellectual circles. Instead, the founders made it their goal to prove that an organization that is dedicated to raising the standard in German work in the applied arts could restore dignity to labor, as well as produce a harmonious national style reflective of the modern age, through the use of cooperation with progressive elements in industry.
The founding meeting took place on October 5 and 6, 1907, in Munich, Germany. It convened as a response to appeals made by twelve individual artists and twelve manufacturers, turning into a new approach to one of the problems affecting educated Germans of the time- how to reinforce the links between designer and producer and between art and industry. About one hundred people were in attendance, consisting mostly artists, industrialists, and art lovers. Because both artists and entrepreneurs attended the meeting, it was anticipated that the Werkbund would succeed in bringing both “artistic and ethical elements” to Germany’s economic life.
According to keynote speaker Fritz Schumacher, the Technische Hochschule architecture professor, the Werkbund’s immediate task was to improve the design and quality of German consumer goods, emphasizing that purpose at hand was neither to increase profits for participating firms nor to please the “aesthetes” who did not care for the product’s current design. Despite that fact that the Werkbund’s goals paralleled the German Arts and Crafts Movement’s, the men gathered at the meeting believed that the Werkbund was necessary in implementing new reforms effectively. They hoped that this would put the group in a better position to encourage a healthy development of the most advanced trends at the time by putting together a host of different talents and creative minds from across the country. However, both the ambivalence between that ideal and the original goal of the Werkbund became a prominent feature for the organization for the next twenty-six years; in other words, a combination of nostalgia for a “lost world” with a resolve to meet “contemporary needs”.
Here, we take a look at the impact of the Werkbund’s contribution to architecture, particularly through Bruno Taut’s “Glashaus”. Taut’s Glashaus was displayed in the Cologne exhibition organized by the Werkbund in 1914. This original structure, however, was a commission not by the exhibition organizers, but rather by the glass industry to house its display. The Glashaus itself posed the problem that it is hard to “reconcile” the steel and glass constructive modernity with strong nineteenth century craftsmanship, especially around the interior room’s cascading waterfall and the colorful spectacle created by the glass work on the walls. As Franz Schwartz puts it, the technical innovation clashed with the “crystal mysticism” that was the central aspect of the design.
The building itself was a result of the exchange of ideas between Taut and poet Paul Scheerbart; these ideas, while not in line with a sense of technical utopia, described the building as a poetic utopia, a utopia in the form of glowing, crystalline glass in architecture. The design of the building led visitors down a carefully constructed path up stairs, which gave a glimpse outside to the real world, before going into a glowing, colorful realm characterized by the upper and lower rooms of the building. In essence, it became both a pageant for the glowing crystal and an advertisement for the glass industry and the exhibition in Cologne.
The building itself was dedicated to Scheerbart at the exhibition in 1914, as it was a reproduction of the architectural ideas Scheerbart exchanged with Taut. The small scale was inspired by late Gothic chapels, while the dome recalled Islamic mosques. As Detlef Mertins described the pavilion itself, it was a symbol of a return to “organic society” or to art itself, in the form of criticism of European humanism, esteeming poverty, and advocating the return to primitivism “through which the creative power of the masses would awaken”.
Walter Gropius himself took an interest to Scheerbart’s writings as well. This was indicated through the incorporation of Scheerbart’s “crystal iconography” incorporated into the Bauhaus manifesto that Gropius himself wrote in April 1919. Interestingly, that same text reveals a model for handicrafts and communal work, otherwise known as emphasis on the creation of prototypes; this later became a common practice for which the Bauhaus was well-known.
The Werkbund itself formed almost immediately after the Jugendstil, which was an art nouveau approach to architecture and decorative arts. The founders, Hermann Muthesius and Henry van de Velde, returned to- and rejected- the ideas of the forerunners of the Arts and Crafts movement by searching for a universal standard that applied to the practice of art and design while maintaining a strong principle in social values. What set it apart from similar associations that formed from this arts and crafts reform movement was its rejection of ‘handicraft romanticism’, an idea favored by most English and Continental cultural critics, and even refused to participate in the collective cultural pessimism in most intellectual circles. Instead, the founders made it their goal to prove that an organization that is dedicated to raising the standard in German work in the applied arts could restore dignity to labor, as well as produce a harmonious national style reflective of the modern age, through the use of cooperation with progressive elements in industry.
The founding meeting took place on October 5 and 6, 1907, in Munich, Germany. It convened as a response to appeals made by twelve individual artists and twelve manufacturers, turning into a new approach to one of the problems affecting educated Germans of the time- how to reinforce the links between designer and producer and between art and industry. About one hundred people were in attendance, consisting mostly artists, industrialists, and art lovers. Because both artists and entrepreneurs attended the meeting, it was anticipated that the Werkbund would succeed in bringing both “artistic and ethical elements” to Germany’s economic life.
According to keynote speaker Fritz Schumacher, the Technische Hochschule architecture professor, the Werkbund’s immediate task was to improve the design and quality of German consumer goods, emphasizing that purpose at hand was neither to increase profits for participating firms nor to please the “aesthetes” who did not care for the product’s current design. Despite that fact that the Werkbund’s goals paralleled the German Arts and Crafts Movement’s, the men gathered at the meeting believed that the Werkbund was necessary in implementing new reforms effectively. They hoped that this would put the group in a better position to encourage a healthy development of the most advanced trends at the time by putting together a host of different talents and creative minds from across the country. However, both the ambivalence between that ideal and the original goal of the Werkbund became a prominent feature for the organization for the next twenty-six years; in other words, a combination of nostalgia for a “lost world” with a resolve to meet “contemporary needs”.
Here, we take a look at the impact of the Werkbund’s contribution to architecture, particularly through Bruno Taut’s “Glashaus”. Taut’s Glashaus was displayed in the Cologne exhibition organized by the Werkbund in 1914. This original structure, however, was a commission not by the exhibition organizers, but rather by the glass industry to house its display. The Glashaus itself posed the problem that it is hard to “reconcile” the steel and glass constructive modernity with strong nineteenth century craftsmanship, especially around the interior room’s cascading waterfall and the colorful spectacle created by the glass work on the walls. As Franz Schwartz puts it, the technical innovation clashed with the “crystal mysticism” that was the central aspect of the design.
The building itself was a result of the exchange of ideas between Taut and poet Paul Scheerbart; these ideas, while not in line with a sense of technical utopia, described the building as a poetic utopia, a utopia in the form of glowing, crystalline glass in architecture. The design of the building led visitors down a carefully constructed path up stairs, which gave a glimpse outside to the real world, before going into a glowing, colorful realm characterized by the upper and lower rooms of the building. In essence, it became both a pageant for the glowing crystal and an advertisement for the glass industry and the exhibition in Cologne.
The building itself was dedicated to Scheerbart at the exhibition in 1914, as it was a reproduction of the architectural ideas Scheerbart exchanged with Taut. The small scale was inspired by late Gothic chapels, while the dome recalled Islamic mosques. As Detlef Mertins described the pavilion itself, it was a symbol of a return to “organic society” or to art itself, in the form of criticism of European humanism, esteeming poverty, and advocating the return to primitivism “through which the creative power of the masses would awaken”.
Walter Gropius himself took an interest to Scheerbart’s writings as well. This was indicated through the incorporation of Scheerbart’s “crystal iconography” incorporated into the Bauhaus manifesto that Gropius himself wrote in April 1919. Interestingly, that same text reveals a model for handicrafts and communal work, otherwise known as emphasis on the creation of prototypes; this later became a common practice for which the Bauhaus was well-known.