Cambridge, May 14, 2013
Which one is the front façade of the Bauhaus?
Of course, as any architecture student can tell you, that is
a silly question. The whole point
is that the building doesn't have façades in the traditional sense, much less
any indication of front or back, or side, or any other notion associated with
static hierarchies.
Yet, if you were coming from the center of Dessau along
Friedrichs Allee (now Gropiusallee) at the time of the Bauhaus, the
first thing you saw was an almost blank dark-gray wall with the word
"BAUHAUS" spelled out in gigantic metal letters applied vertically
across three levels.
If that is not a front façade--an iconographic expression of
the institution in built form--I don't know what is!
The interesting thing is that Gropius chooses for this role
a minor side elevation (in the process solving the classic end-bay problem of a
long volume.) Afterwards, he lets
your eye glide along the glass-and-steel elevation of the
workshops--conveniently recessed from the property line so you get just enough
of a perspective--until it finds the transversal volume of classrooms oriented
with the street that leads to the train station.
By then you're pretty much aware that the building is anything but frontal.
Well done series.
ReplyDelete- paperpants