Walter Gropius

Walter Adolf Gropius, founder of the Bauhaus

Walter Adolph Gropius, born in Berlin Germany May 18, 1883 - died July 5, 1969. Gropius was a German architect and founder of Bauhaus (one of the most influential design & architecture schools and design movements of all time), and along with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of "modern" architecture.

Leaving Germany

In 1934 Walter Gropius left Germany due to the rising power of the Nazi Party. Many of his colleagues and Bauhaus staff did the same. He lived and worked in Britain and then in The united States of America.

Later, in 1945, Gropius founded The Architects' Collaborative (TAC) in Cambridge, Massachusetts with a group of younger architects. After this establishment, TAC would become one of the best known and respected architectural firms in the world.

Important Buildings

the Fagus Factory, 1910-1911, Alfeld an der Leine, Germany

Office and Factory Buildings at the Werkbund Exhibition, 1914, Cologne, Germany

Bauhaus School and Faculty, 1925-1932, Housin, Dessau, Germany

Village College, 1936, Impington, Cambridge, England

The Gropius House, 1937, Lincoln, Massachusetts, USA

Aluminum City Terrace housing project, 1942-1944, New Kensington, Pennsylvania, USA

Harvard Graduate Center, 1949-1950, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA (The Architects' Collaborative)

University of Baghdad, 1957-1960, Baghdad, Iraq

John F. Kennedy Federal Office Building, 1963-1966, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Pan Am Building (now the Metlife Building), 1958-1963, New York, New York, with Pietro Belluschi and project architects Emery Roth & Sons

Interbau Apartment blocks, 1957, Hansaviertel, Berlin, Germany, with The Architects' Collaborative and Wils Ebert

The award-winning Wayland High School, 1961, Wayland, Massachusetts, USA

Embassy of the United States, 1959-1961, Athens, Greece (The Architects' Collaborative and consulting architect Pericles Sakellarios)

Links

Bauhaus: A website about the Bauhaus and the People involved in the Bauhaus.
Bauhaus Furniture: Bauhaus furniture; information, pictures and best places to buy Bauhaus and reproductions of Bauhaus Furniture.
Walter Gropius: More on Walter Gropius.
Herbert Bayer: Herbert Bayer
Wassily Kandinsky: Wassily Kandinsky
Marcel Breuer: Marcel Breuer
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe: A Very famous Architect and Designer
Josef Albers: Josef Albers
Johannes Itten: Johannes Itten

Something you probably didn't know...

In 1923, Gropius designed one of his most famous works... door handles. Considered an icon of 20th century design and often noted as one of the most influential designs to emerge from the Bauhaus.