Modernism I

This document discusses the historical and social context of modernism in housing from 1860-1930. It covers the industrialization, urbanization, and poor housing conditions that led to the housing reform movement. Key aspects of modernist housing design emphasized in the document include rational and efficient floor plans enabled by new construction technologies, standardization and mass production of housing, and the view of the home as a "machine for living" rather than an expression of individual identity. Functionalism and simplified geometric forms replaced historical references in pursuit of an orderly aesthetic appropriate to modern life.

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Modernism I

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Jotaro Joestar

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AAR 4812 / Theory and

History of housing

Modernism I
23. August 2011 / Eli Støa

Weissenhofsiedlung (1926-27), Stuttgart. apartmentbuilding, Mies van der

Rohe Foto: Kirsch, 1989
Historical and social context
• Background
– Industrialisation, urbanisation, speculation, poor housing
conditions for workers 1860 – 1900
– Housing reform movement
• First world war
– Inflation, unemployment, housing shortage
• The second industrial revolution
– Organisation, management and increasing efficiency of
production processes (Taylorism)
The second industrial revolution
• Organisation, management and increasing efficiency
of production processes (Taylorism)
• Distributions of work and specialisation
• Private cars
• Electrification of homes
• New consumer commodities
”Ford fixed in our minds the reciprocal concepts of mass
•
production and mass consumption”
Norge 1900-1920
•Glødelampen (1905)
•Bad og wc installert på slottet i
Kristiania (1906)
•Første elektriske støvsugere,
vaskemaskiner og kjøleskap (ca. 1910)
•Sentralvarme vanlig i borgerskapets
villaer (1915-20)
•Ca. 10.000 biler i Norge i 1920
•64 % av befolkningen bor i hus
med elektrisk strøm (1920) (mot 37
% i USA og 17 % i bl.a. Sverige)
•Første dypfryste matvarer (1928)
•Første norskproduserte elektriske
komfyr (1920-tallet)
Ideological basis

• Break with history

• A rational approach to architecture
• Social agenda
• Standardisation / mass production
• Functionalism: a new aesthetic
What is Modern?
“The current, the new and the transient: all three
levels of meaning refer to the peculiar importance
that is ascribed to the present in the concept of
modernity. Modernity is what gives the present the
specific quality that makes it different from the past
and points the way towards the future. Modernity is
also described as being a break with tradition, and
as typifying everything that rejects the inheritance of
the past”
(Heynen, 1999:9)
A new era

”modern man, who no

longer dresses in
historical garments but
wears modern clothes, …
needs a modern
(architecture)
appropriate to him and
his time”
(W.
Gropius
in
Conrads,
1964:95)
A new era

A new comprehension of the home:

• From an increasing ’homecentredness’ after

industrialisation
…to the avant gardists dissociation with the
introversion of the bourgeouis home sphere’s
Foto: Rolness, 1995
A new comprehension of the home
• Le Corbusier wanted to replace: “(the)
sentimental hysteria surrounding the cult of the
home”, with a more rational approach to
dwellings as “machines for living”

• ”The modernist aesthetic is quite antagonistic to

the idea of the home as a ”refuge of privacy and an
assertion of individual – or family – identity”
expressed in the knick knacks on the shelves, the
antimacassars on the airmchairs, the filmy curtains
at the windows, the screen before the fireplace.”
(Morley?)
A rational approach

”Nature was known by its parts, but not as a

whole. Similarly, urban functions could be
identified and improved, according to the
management principles of Ford and Taylor,
and then effectively reorganized in time and
space”
(Rowe, 1993:162)
Rationality

Le
Corbusier(1932): ”Biolo
gical unit” (cell) 14 m2
Christine Frederick used Taylors principles when designing the
dwelling in ”Scientific Mangement of the Home” (1912)
”Die neue sachlichkeit”

•Blocks of flats oriented

north-south in order to have
similar and optimal and
similar sunlight conditions
for all
•Rational production
•”Scientific functionalism”

(Ill. T. Brantenberg, 1996)

Scientific basis for architecture

”Architecture was to have a firm scientific

basis, but more than that, it was to take its
inspiration from the rationalism and
experimentation of sciences” (Rowe, 1993:45)
Scientific basis for architecture

”Functionalism was one of the most alarming

aspects of the modernist agenda in the early
twentieth-century because architects who
adhered to it had confidence in a ’science’ that
cannot be validated scientifically and believed
that the user was predictable and obedient”
(Jonathan Hill, 2003:17)
Social agenda

• Improved living conditions for the working class

• Universal criteria for housing quality
– Physiological, psychological, social medicin
• The minimum dwelling: ”wohnung für das
existenzminimum” (CIAM 1929)
Universal housing norms

• Physiological needs: thermal comfort, light, air, recreation

• Psychological needs: privacy, aesthetics satisfaction, attending
‘social standards
• Social medicine: protection against pollution, public security,
crime prevention..
(Rowe, 1993)
The minimum
house

”…was seen as a social

tool indispensable to
the new era (…) it
embodied ”an appeal
for scientific certainty
to overcome customs
of tradition””
(Le Corbusier, 1964 i Rowe,
1993:57)
Standardisation / mass production