Adolf Loos in Brno

TIC BRNO ↓ Adolf Loos in Brno

Brno Architecture Manual (BAM): Guide to the architecture of 1918–1989

A project focused on the popularization a smart phone to get information about of architecture and its presentation a building or listen to its story right on on the city streets. Its website makes the streets of Brno. Walks through the accessible to experts and the general city are also available in printed brochures public a database of architectural exam- and a book guide. The interwar period has ples. Short texts and audio recordings already been comprehensively addressed. available for download capture brief his- Now, the focus is on the post-war period, tories of the buildings, the circumstances namely the time under the so-called com- of their creation, and the stories of the munist or socialist regime that ended with owners and architects. To get the proper the Velvet Revolution in 1989. information, the Brno pavements have marks with the website and codes for each building. These make it easy to use www.bam.brno.cz 1 Sculpting studio of Adolf Loos Sr Adolf Loos’s family home

2 Adolf Loos Sr Sculptures on the National 3 House (Zemský dům), today the Constitutional Court (Ústavní soud)

3 Adolf Loos Sr Fountain with sculptures of three 8 fishing boys in Lužánky 10

4 Besední dům, today the Brno 12 1 Philharmonic (Filharmonie Brno)

M. HORÁKOVÉ MORAVSKÉ 5 Second German Imperial-Royal State NÁMĚSTÍ Gymnasium, today the Brno City 2 BRATISLAVSKÁ Municipality (Magistrát m. Brna) KOLIŠTĚ CEJL 4 6 Imperial-Royal German State Industrial College in Brno, today the Brno City 6 NÁMĚSTÍ Municipality (Magistrát m. Brna) SVOBODY

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VLHKÁ VLHKÁ 7 Museum of Applied Arts in Brno (Uměleckoprůmyslové muzeum v Brně) 11

8 House of Karel Herold KŘENOVÁ (Dům Karla Herolda) DENISOVY SADY 9 Bauer Chateau (Bauerův zámeček)

MASNÁ

10 Unbuilt House on a roof 9 (Dům na střeše) HLADÍKOVA ZVONAŘKA 11 United Works of Decorative Art (Spojené uměleckoprůmyslové závody) and Housing Culture (Bytová kultura)

12 A. Loos memorial (to be completed) 01 02 07 08

SCULPTING STUDIO OF ADOLF LOOS SR in Břeclav and Třebíč and owned a marble ADOLF LOOS SR plans by architects Anton Hefft and Robert MUSEUM OF APPLIED ARTS IN BRNO hall of the Museum of Applied Arts. This HOUSE OF KAREL HEROLD three-wing layout with a side staircase an- ADOLF LOOS’S FAMILY HOME mine in Nedvědice under Pernštejn Castle. SCULPTURES ON THE NATIONAL HOUSE, Raschka. For Adolf Loos Sr, this was his last HUSOVA 14 impressive museum building on the Brno ring JIRÁSKOVA 26 other garden room with a separate entrance. KOUNICOVA 20–22 The place of Loos’s birth is commemorated TODAY THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT large commission, as he died in March 1879 road was designed in 1884 by the museum The new room and other changes were prob- at the entrance to the Hotel Continental JOŠTOVA 8 at the age of 50. The Architect’s Club (Klub architektů) in director, architect Johann Georg von Schön, During 1888–1889, builders Heinrich Schmidt ably designed for Karel Herold by Adolf Loos, In the location of the current Hotel Conti- with a plaque that was installed during Prague and the Spojené umělecko-průmys- in a historicist style referencing the Floren- and Gottlob Alber designed and constructed based on later correspondence and the tes- nental, not far from a former municipal cem- hotel renovations in 1964. Just opposite, During 1875–1878, Adolf Loos Sr worked lové závody of Jan Vaněk in Brno initiated tine Renaissance. On 30 January 1925, Adolf 15 single-storey family houses with front timony of Loos’s student, architect Robert etery (now Tyrš Park), stood the sculpting stone blocks from the former Loos studio together with sculptor Jan Tomola on a series of lectures by important avant-gar- Loos gave a lecture on economics in archi- gardens on Tivoli (now Jiráskova) Street. Hlawatsch. It is his first building in Brno in studio of Adolf Loos Sr. It is where, on 10 De- rise from the ground. This commemoration a prestigious commission – sculptural fig- de local and foreign architects that took tecture. His lecture and the contributions of After the homes were completed, they were a period after he had finished several fa- cember 1870, a son was born to Adolf and of the family home of the famous architect ures decorating the attics of the National place from November 1924 through February other famous architects, including Walter sold to private owners, including house num- mous buildings and interiors in Vienna and Marie Loos who was baptized in the nearby is the work of art historian Zdeněk Kuděl- House. Construction of a unique parliament 1925 in Brno and Prague. Those in Brno were Gropius, director of the Bauhaus school, ber 26. The home gradually changed owners, Pilsen. The house is privately owned and not Church of St Thomas (kostel sv. Tomáše) ka, architects Zdeněk Řihák and Bohuslav building with an assembly chamber that organized by the Vice Rector of the profes- and J. J. Pieter Oud, influenced a number of and in 1910 it was bought by textile factory accessible to the public. as Adolf after his father. Loos’s business Fuchs, and sculptor Jiří Marek. sat on the Brno ring road was carried out soriate of the Brno University of Technolo- young Brno architects. owner Karel Herold, who had it renovated had subsidiaries and memorial warehouses by the company of Josef Arnold, based on gy (Vysoké učení technické) in the lecture to suit his needs and added to the original

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ADOLF LOOS SR During 1853–1855, a Renaissance Revival BESEDNÍ DŮM, TODAY THE BRNO concert hall. Adolf Loos expressed his admira- BAUER CHATEAU from Hlinky Street. Traveller, lawyer, and en- UNBUILT HOUSE ON A ROOF In February 1931, however, Jordan ended FOUNTAIN WITH SCULPTURES OF THREE pavilion was built based on plans by archi- PHILHARMONIC tion for the building in his essay “O Šetrnosti” VÝSTAVIŠTĚ 1 thusiastic anthropologist Viktor von Bauer SEDLÁKOVA 27 their cooperation with these words: “After FISHING BOYS IN LUŽÁNKY tect Ludwig Förster. In 1860, a fountain with KOMENSKÉHO NÁM. 534/8 (Regarding Economy) published in the maga- moved in the circle of Viennese modernists, thoroughly examining your proposal and PARK LUŽÁNKY, LIDICKÁ sculptures of three fishing boys by Franz zine Bytová kultura in 1924–1925: “Whenever This chateau was built in the early 19th cen- where he got to know Adolf Loos. Around In the location of the current three-storey carefully considering it, I have unfortunately Melnitzký and Adolf Loos Sr was built in At the end of the 19th century, the Czech Brno I was in Brno and saw the German House and tury as part of the grounds of an Old Brno 1925, he asked Loos to decorate his Brno apartment row house, built by the Eisler come to the conclusion that it is not an In place of what was originally a utility and front of the facade facing the park. Cultural Community wanted its own beautiful the Czech Besední dům, the character of sugar factory owned by Moritz von Bauer. headquarters. His dining room panelled in brothers’ company, there was originally to option for my purposes. You must trust me ornamental garden owned by the Jesuits, social centre. For this purpose, they chose these two buildings immediately told me what From 1911, the family business was run by Cipollino marble and decorated with figu- be a house designed by Loos with an en- that it was a hard battle between my wishes who were abolished by Emperor Joseph II, the architect behind the Vienna ring road, will one day happen to Brno. It is obvious! his grandson Viktor. Under his management, rative stucco (even some of the bedroom tirely separate penthouse flat with a terrace and my resources.” the oldest (and first public) urban park in Theophil Hansen. Based on his plans, during I would like these two pictures reproduced the area in Pisárky was forcibly sold to make furnishings have been preserved) is the only at the top. At the end of 1930, the builder the Czech lands was founded in 1786. In 1870–1873 a Renaissance Revival palace was next to each other somewhere. But given room for the Brno Exhibition Centre. The publicly accessible preserved work by Loos Heinrich Jordan, a liqueur trader, ordered accordance with the trends of the 1930s, built with a massive decorated attic with what I have recently seen in Prague, I think two-storey chateau lay in the south-west- in his home town, although we know today from the famous architect a design for its original style as a French formal garden a balustrade and sculptures. Adolf Loos that Czech architects are moving to the style ern part of the grounds with its classicist that Loos offered Bauer plans for the entire a house that they consulted on several was changed into an English landscape park. Sr contributed with sculptures in the main of Brno’s German House. That is a bad sign.” facade facing the original tree-lined entrance interior of the chateau. times in person and by post.

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SECOND GERMAN IMPERIAL-ROYAL STATE but his diligence is unbalanced and he very IMPERIAL-ROYAL GERMAN STATE took his school-leaving exam. At that time, UNITED WORKS OF DECORATIVE ART journal, focused on modern design and A. LOOS MEMORIAL essay “Architecture” for Der Sturm in 1910. GYMNASIUM, TODAY THE BRNO CITY carelessly corrects his written work. Latin, INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE IN BRNO, TODAY during 1888–1891, a new school building with AND HOUSING CULTURE architecture, had great influence in Brno O. MORYS, J. SEDLÁK For the 150th anniversary of his birth, the MUNICIPALITY Czech, German, and Mathematics unsatis- THE BRNO CITY MUNICIPALITY stucco by sculptor Heinrich Leger was con- MASARYKOVA 31 cultural circles and beyond. The then-di- JANÁČKOVO NÁMĚSTÍ site of his birthplace on Kounicova Street DOMINIKÁNSKÉ NÁMĚSTÍ 1 factory; only Natural History satisfactory HUSOVA 12 structed at what is now 8 Kudelova Street, rector of the United Works of Decorative will have a new Memorial to the Architect and Physical Education excellent.” based on plans by Wilhelm Dwořak and Alois During 1923, Adolf Loos travelled to Brno Art (Spojené uměleckoprůmyslové závody) “A house has to please everyone. In contrast Adolf Loos from sculptor Oldřich Morys and During 1871–1883, the Zweites deutsches Based on the response to the 1873 Vienna Prastorfer, architects and teachers at the regularly. The architects, Jan Vaněk, and Jan Vaněk got Adolf Loos to represent the to a work of art, should it then have nothing architect Jaroslav Sedlák, who based the k.k. Staatsgymnasium sat in the Old National World's Fair, the K. K. deutsche höhere school. Significant graduates of the school Ernst Wiesner and art historian Bohuslav company in Paris. Vaněk’s admiration for in common with art and should architec- plan on Loos’s tombstone, made based on his House (Starý zemský dům). Adolf Loos did Staatsgewerbeschule was established in include famous architects such as Leopold Markalous had invited him to the editorial Loos’s work is clear from the designs for ture not be categorized as an art? Exactly own design and located in the Vienna Cen- one year of school here during 1880–1881. Brno by Eduard Wild, a student of the German Bauer (1891), Hubert Gessner (1889), Josef board of the magazine Housing Culture furniture and a group of family houses on so. Only a very small part of architecture tral Cemetery. “The main idea of the design His “success” as a student can be seen in his architect Gottfried Semper, who became the Hoffmann (1891), and Ernst Wiesner (1909). (Bytová kultura). It was published monthly Alešova Street, numbers 34–40. The idea belongs among the arts: tombstones and is to create a negative (imprint) of the site still preserved school reports in a gymnasi- school’s first headmaster. The school sat on and had a German version, Die Wohnung- for these “houses under a single roof” was memorials. Everything else, everything that of Loos’s last resting place for the location um in Jihlava, where he went after his year Brno’s newly built ring road, now 12 Husova skultur, which ended after only a year (and inspired by Loos’s houses in the Viennese serves a purpose, must be excluded from where he was born and grew up and which in Brno. “His behaviour is rather appropriate, Street, and was where in 1889 Adolf Loos was renewed in the 1930s in Prague). This settlement of Friedensstadt from 1921. the realm of art.” So wrote Adolf Loos in his shaped him to a considerable degree.” TIC BRNO ←

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Publisher: TIC BRNO, p. o.

Cover photo: interior of Bauer Chateau, M. Dvořáková

Photos and images: Brno City Museum (Muzeum města Brna), Brno City Archive (Archiv města Brna) visualization of the memorial: O. Morys and J. Sedlák reproduction: Bytová kultura I 1924/1925

Text: Lucie Valdhansová, Veronika Jičínská

TIC BRNO, p. o. is fi nancially supported by the City of Brno.

2020