Gropiuss House

Pan Am Building

W A LTER G R O P IU S

Introduction:

Born:
May 18, 1883 in

Berlin, Germany
Died:
July 5, 1969
Full Name:
Walter Adolph Gropius
Education:
Technical Universities
in Munich and Berlin

Introduction
AGermanarchitect.
Art educator.
Founder of theBauhausSchool

which became a dominant force in

architecture and the applied arts
in the 20th century.
He is widely regarded as one of
the pioneering masters ofmodern
architecture.

Selected W orks:
i.

1910-1911:Fagus
works, Alfred an
der Leine, Germany

ii. 1925:The Bauhaus

building, Dessau,
Germany
iii. 1937:Gropius

house, Lincoln, MA
iv. 1950:Harvard

graduation center,
Cambridge, MA
v.

1963:Pan am
building, in
collaboration with
Pietro Belluschi, New
York

Career life of W alter G ropius:

Worked under the German architect Peter Behrens from 1907-

10.One of the first members of the utilitarian school. His fellow

employees at this time includedLudwig Mies van der
Rohe,Le Corbusier, andDietrich Marcks.
He was influenced by the writings of Frank Lloyd Wright.
In 1910 Gropius left the firm of Behrens and together with

fellow employeeAdolf Meyerestablished a practice in Berlin.

Together they share credit for one of the seminal modernist

buildings created during this period: FaguswerkinGermany, a

shoelastfactory. Although Gropius and Meyer only designed
the facade, the glass curtain walls of this building
demonstrated both the modernist principle thatform reflects
functionand Gropius's concern with providing healthful
conditions for the working class.
Other works of his early period include the office and factory

building for theWerkbund Exhibition (1914)inCologne.

Career life of W alter G ropius:

In 1913, Gropius published an article about "The

Development of Industrial Buildings," which

included about a dozen photographs of factories
andgrain elevatorsin North America.
A very influential text, this article had a strong
influence on other European modernists,
includingLe Corbusierand Erich Mendelssohn, both
of whom reprinted Gropius's grain elevator
pictures between 1920 and 1930.
Gropius's career was interrupted by the outbreak
ofWorld War Iin 1914. Called up immediately as a
reservist, Gropius served as a sergeant major at the
Western frontduring the war years, and was

Projects:
Walter Gropius opposed the Nazi regime
and left Germany secretly in 1934.
After several years in England, Gropius
began teaching architecture at Harvard
University.
As a Harvard professor, Gropius
introduced concepts and design principles
teamwork ,standardization, and
prefabrication.
He lived and worked in Britain, as part of
theIsokongroup with Fry.

G R O P IU S H O U SE:
In 1937, moved on to

theUnited States.
The house he built for
himself in
Lincoln,Massachusetts,
(now known asGropius
House)
it was influential in
bringingInternational
Modernismto the U.S.
It had a dramatic impact
on American
architecture.

G R O P IU S H O U SE:
Its detailing keeps

strongly to the principles

of the Bauhaus.
exploiting simple, welldesigned but massproduced fittings for
steel wall lights, chromed
banisters etc., as well as
in the structure of the
house (glass block walls
complementing the
wooden frame and New
England clapboarding).

G R O P IU S H O U SE:
The house is designed

and detailed to work

almost theatrically as a
whole. The lighting in
the dining room, mixes
a single art-gallery
spotlight recessed in
the ceiling, whose
beam exactly covers
the circular table but
not the diners a second
spotlight in the study.

G R O P IU S H O U SE:
Gropius uses interior

clapboard for further

ingenious lighting effects:
set vertically on the walls
of the entrance hall, the
angle of each overlapping
board stops light, rather
than rain, reaching the
near edge of its neighbor
the result is an appealing
pattern of shadows
generated by the
contrastingly simple massproduced wall lights.

Pan A m B uilding
MetLife Building
skyscraperlocated inNew York City.
It was the largest commercial office

building in the world when it opened

on March 7, 1963
one of thefifty tallest buildings in the
United States.
Pan Am originally had 15 floors in the
Pan Am Building

Architecture of Pan A m
B uilding
Designed byEmery Roth

& Sonswith the

assistance ofWalter
GropiusandPietro
Belluschi.
Building is an example of
anInternational
styleskyscrapers.
large floors, simple
massing, and an absence
of ornamentation inside
or out.

D esign
The design is inspired by a

never built project from Le

Corbusier and by the
slenderPirelli Towerin
Milan (Gio Ponti and Pier
Luigi Nervi, 1959.The
exterior is covered with
concrete panels to
strengthen the building
visually. The 246 meter
tall building was
completed in 1963 and
incorporates an immense
390,700 m2 office space.

Statistics of Pan A m B uilding

Height: 808ft

(246.6 m)
Floors:59 (above
ground)
Floor space: 3.14
million ft (307,000
m)

The A rchitects'
C ollaborative(TA C )
In 1945, Gropius foundedThe Architects'
Collaborative(TAC) based in Cambridge with a group of
younger architects. The original partners
includedNorman C. Fletcher,Jean B. Fletcher,John C.
Harkness,Sarah P. Harkness,Robert S. MacMillan, Louis
A. MacMillen, andBenjamin C. Thompson. TAC would
become one of the most well-known and respected
architectural firms in the world.
TAC went bankrupt in 1995.
Gropius died in 1969 inBoston,aged 86. Today, he is
remembered not only by his various buildings but also
by the district ofGropiusstadtinBerlin.
In the early 1990s, a series of books entitledThe Walter
Gropius Archivewas published covering his entire
architectural career.