ABSTRACT
Bruno Taut was born in 1880 in Königsberg, East Prussia, which made him one of the oldest of the postwar avant-garde architects. Beginning in 1904, Taut participated in national competitions for a range of buildings, from schools to churches, to development proposals like the 1907 Hamburg Wohnhauskolonie. Projects like the competition entry for the Darmstadt Train Station and the Turbine House in Harkort demonstrate his interest in traditional forms and materials, but also his engagement with classical norms. The Turbine House is similarly symmetrical, with gently pitched roofs that in elevation look like an abstracted pediment, but it borrows more from German vernacular traditions than classicism. Along with Gothic architecture, Taut had an abiding fascination for the architecture of Ancient Eastern cultures, evident in the projects he highlighted in his publications, the books he read, and the formal resolution of some of his projects. Taut carefully considered the ways in which art practice could be the basis for architectural innovation.
