Test your design IQ
MANILA, Philippines -Who is the 20th-century Jewish German architect known for his expressionist architecture in the 1920s, as well as for developing a dynamic functionalism in his projects for department stores and cinemas?
He was born in 1887 in Allenstein, East Prussia, the fifth of six children of a hatmaker and a shopkeeper.
In 1908, he began studying architecture at the University of Berlin; two years later he transferred to the Technical Institute of Munich, when he graduated cum laude in 1912. He was influenced by Theodor Fischer, an architect, whose own work fell between neo-classical and Jugendstil.
From 1912 to 1914, he worked as an independent architect in Munich. It was during this time that he met cello-playing astrophysicist Erwin Finlay Freundlich. It was through his relationship with the latter that he had the opportunity to design and build the Einstein Tower. The building, in its expressionistic form giving the impression of concrete as a building material, was mostly built in brick and then covered with plaster.
It was also during this time that he built a hat factory in Luckenwalde that established his reputation. His practice grew with projects like the Steinberg Hat Factory with a strict angular form; and the Red Flag Textile Factory in Leningrad, the complex of buildings of which is included in the List of the objects of historical and cultural heritage issued by the government of Saint Petersburg in 2001.
He was also active in retail architecture during this time — the Schocken Department Store in Nuremberg (1925-26), Stuttgart (1926-28), and Chemnitz (1927-28), known for its arched front with horizontal strips of windows.
He also worked on the extension and conversion of Cohen and Epstein Department Store in Duisburg, and the Woga-Komplex and Universum-Kino cinema in Berlin.
In the spring of 1933, in the wake of growing anti-semitism and the rise of Nazis in Germany, he fled to England. In 1934, he began planning on behalf of Chaim Weizmann, later the President of Israel, a series of projects in Palestine during the British mandate.
In 1935, he opened an office in Jerusalem, and planned Jerusalem buildings in international style that greatly influenced local architecture. Here, he built many famous buildings: Weizmann House and the three laboratories at the Weizmann Institute of Science, the Anglo Palestine Bank in Jerusalem, Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus, and Rambam Hospital in Haifa, among others.
From 1941 until his death, he lived in the US and taught at the University of California in Berkeley. He also served as an advisor to the US government. In 1943, he collaborated with the US Army and Standard Oil to build a German Village, a set of replicas of typical German working class housing estates, which would be of key importance in acquiring the know-how and experience necessary to carry out firebombing in Berlin.
In 1945, he established himself in San Francisco, where until his death in 1953, he undertook various projects, mostly for Jewish communities.
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Last week’s question: Who designed the Seattle Art Museum?
Answer: Robert Venturi
Winner: Erich Nicholo Cruz from Rizal
