1 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
Eileen Gray and E.1027: Living with Ghosts - Tranquillity & Tragedy
Introduction Eileen Gray (1878‐1976) was a pioneer designer within the Modern movement, though her contribution only started to be fully appreciated after her death. E.1027, completed in 1929, is remarkable for the way in which Gray seamlessly fused many of the key tenets of Modernism and industrial production with more personal, emotional, intimate touches from her childhood in Ireland and her twenties in Art Nouveau Paris.
Gray recognised that it was hard for people to adopt cold, stark Modernism and adapted it to make it more welcoming. More celebrated Modern architects, contemporary to Gray, notably Corbusier, did not recognise the importance of emotionalism until far later in their careers. What makes Gray’s achievement all the more impressive is that E.1027 was the first house she had ever designed and built, as she was approaching 50, without having received any formal architectural training. As such, Maison en Bord de Mer represents the embodiment of her life and the pinnacle of her broad and deep artistic understanding.
Gray’s life prior to E.1027 Eileen Gray was born in Ireland, the youngest of five siblings, to a Scottish‐titled, Irish family. Her childhood was a troubled one – she frequently complained of seeing ghosts. The reworking of her elegant Georgian family home, by her parents in 1895 into a nineteenth century Tudor‐style country house distressed Gray and was a significant factor behind her move to London in 18981. She retained a photo of the original property until her death, and it is reasonable to assume that the elegant simplicity of this home and its associated memories were an influencing factor in the composition of E.1027.
Brownswood – before and after reconstruction in the Victorian Gothic style2
In London, Gray studied at the Slade School, an institution with a strong emphasis on the Arts & Crafts Movement. Her initial enthusiasm waned, however, as she was not convinced by the teaching methods, which focused on the emulation of the pre‐Rafaelite masters and the teachings of Ruskin. Staff encouraged students to visit galleries to copy masterpieces and it was during a trip to the V&A that Gray first became exposed to the laborious art of oriental lacquering3.
1 Peter Adam, Eileen Gray – Architect Designer, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2000), p.16. 2 Ibid, pp.16-17. 3 Adam, p.22.
2 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
In 1900, Gray visited Paris to see the Exposition Universale. She fell in love with the city and its modernism, and two years later, she moved there. Through her acquaintance with Seizo Sugawara, she honed her lacquer skills, and by 1912 she had a wealthy client list. In 1914, she began producing the “Le Destin” screen for Jacques Doucet, a patron of the arts4.
Le Destin – Classical side5 Le Destin – modernist side
“Le Destin” depicts a classical representation on one side, with a modern, abstracted image on the reverse, indicating Gray’s ability to adapt and move between artistic movements, and also her ethos that design should be polyvalent, flexible and beautiful – all evidenced in E.1027.
Working with lacquer requires a huge amount of patience – over 20 coats are required to be overlaid, and each coat must have time to dry before the next is applied. It is also extremely punishing for the hands. It is instructive that Gray focused on this metier, and the patience it requires and her willingness to get her hands dirty in what is still a male‐dominated profession.
World War I saw Gray temporarily relocate to London. Upon her return to Paris in 1919 she had become more disillusioned with her lacquer work and its “class‐bound opulence”6, and began to question how art could address social inequity and wider issues.
At that time, she met the Romanian architect Jean Badovici (1893‐1956). Despite being 14 years her junior they became lovers. In 1923, they worked together on L’Architecture Vivante. Badovici was attracted to Gray’s financial independence and artistic ability, whilst Gray admired his drive and desire to create meaningful work7.
4 Stefan Heckler & Christian F. Muller, Eileen Gray, Works & Projects (Barcelona: Gustavo Gill, 1993), p.13. 5 Adam, pp.78-79. 6 Frances Stonor-Saunders, The House That Eileen Built,
3 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
Whilst Badovici gave Gray exposure to the designs of the latest buildings, Gray largely taught herself architecture through the study of contemporary works – most significantly Adolf Loos’s Villa Moissi in 1923, where she recognised the importance of independence of volumes and the privacy benefits derived from a labyrinthine internal arrangement within a compact entity, which was later reinterpreted within the plans of E.1027.
4 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
E.1027 – Gray’s masterpiece In 1925, after weeks of scouring the coast for the ideal location, Gray found the site for E.1027 at Roquebrune‐Cap‐Martin, between Menton and Nice, in the south of France, on a rocky position between the sea and a railway track. Whilst Badovici helped mentor Gray with some of the technical aspects of the plans, for example, suggesting pilotis to help raise up the living room and the spiral staircase to access the roof terrace, the lion’s share of the design is attributed to Gray. The project was intended to be a retreat for Badovici, but also as a show home to show future clients8.
E.1027 site map and photo9 ‐ a grounded ocean liner
In 1926, work began on site. Gray rented an apartment in Roquebrune, hired a mason and two assistants and remained on site for three years, overseeing the work. It was hard and lonely work, a true labour of love. There was no road access, so materials had to be transported to site by wheelbarrow10.
Badovici visited occasionally – after all, the house was to be his summer residence – the land had been bought in his name, and the design was in response to his needs. The name of the house – E.1027 ‐ is a cipher that reflects Gray and Badovici’s co‐operation – “E" for "Eileen", 10 for the letter "J", 2 for "B" and 7 for "G" ‐ "Eileen Jean Badovici Gray". It is testimony to Gray’s private nature that she encoded the house name. The alpha‐numeric name may also have been a light‐hearted poke at the machinist aspects of Modernism11.
8 Adam, p.175. 9 Colin St. John Wilson, The Other Tradition of Modern Architecture – The Uncompleted Project, (London: Academy Editions, 1995), p.108. 10 Stonor-Saunders. 11 Adam, p.191.
5 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
E.1027 was designed as a maison minimum – a “house envisaged from a social point of view, minimum space, maximum of comfort”12 – simple, yet efficient. It is a house primarily designed for independence and study, but sufficiently large to welcome a select group of friends and entertain them in comfort. The L‐shaped dwelling occupies a ground footprint of 150 square metres on the first floor, and 110 square metres on the ground13, reflecting the building’s sympathetic construction, nestled into the side of the cliff. The compactness of the design was in keeping with the philosophy of the post‐war reconstruction and an attempt to evolve an efficient pattern book design that could be rolled out on a large‐scale14.
E.1027 – external form Many of the design principles of E.1027 had been spelled out by Le Corbusier in his “Five Points of a New Architecture” – an accessible roof deck, a house raised off the ground by pilotis, open‐plan living with free‐facades and ribbon windows. The division between outdoor and indoor space is deliberately eroded.
East Elevation 1:20015
12 Caroline Constant and Wilfred Wang (eds.), Eileen Gray, An Architecture For All Senses, (Frankfurt: Deutsches Architektur—Museum, 1996), p. 93. 13 Adam, p.192. 14 Ibid, p.195. 15 Heckler & Muller, p.110.
6 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
West Elevation 1:20016
South Elevation 1:20017
North Elevation 1:20018
16 Heckler & Muller, p.110. 17 Ibid, p.111. 18 Ibid, p.111.
7 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
Like Corbusier, Gray was fascinated by the engineering sophistication of cruise liners, and, like him, she had meticulously measured her cabin dimensions during her travels. E.1027 recalls this strongly. Life rings adorn the terrace balustrade, as if the house was a boat that had become subsumed by the cliffs at Roquebrune.
E.1027 from the south west – observe the strong maritime associations on the terrace19
E.1027 was also one of the first houses that attempted to use technology to adapt Modernist architecture to the Southern European climate, through the use of shutters that could slide horizontally and / or fold out like an accordion20. The balustrade on the terrace was made of removable canvas “so that in winter one could warm one’s legs in the heat of the sun”21.
E.1027 – pioneering environmental control for modernist houses in Southern Europe22
19 Adam, p.195. 20 Constant & Wang, p.123. 21 Adam, p.205. 22 Ibid, p.200.
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Internal configurations – the true merit Where Gray succeeded with E.1027 was where occasionally Corbusier failed with his work ‐ namely to demonstrate an understanding of human behaviour within the function of a house. She remarked:
Exterior architecture seems to have interested avant‐garde architects at the expense of the interior. As though a house ought to be conceived more for the pleasure of the eyes than for the comfort of its inhabitants… it is not a matter of simply constructing beautiful ensembles of lines, but, above all, dwellings for people.23 Unlike some of her contemporary Modernists for whom geometric forms and industrial process were the zenith of achievement and purity, Gray questioned the logic of enduring discomfort to be a slave to process24. Some commentators have suggested the sensitivity of E.1027’s design is in part because of Gray’s gender – “a woman’s touch” a statement that Gray herself would have likely despised given her work itself was helping erode the usual stereotypes and professional divisions on the grounds of sex.
Gray said, in a rebuff to Corbusier:
A house is not a machine to live in. It is the shell of man, his extension, his release, his spiritual emanation. [It is] a living organism in which each of the inhabitants could... find total independence and an atmosphere of solitude and concentration.25
23 Adam, p.233. 24Constant & Wang, p. ii. 25 Ibid, p.109.
9 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
First Floor plans, 1:20026
Ground Floor plans 1:20027
The house comprises a large, south‐facing living room, extended by a terrace giving onto the Mediterranean with views to the west of Monte Carlo. Upon entry via the main door, the full‐ height wardrobe acts as a curved screen, protecting the privacy of those in the living room from those entering the house, and adding to the mystery for the new arrival.
26 Heckler & Muller, p.108. 27 Ibid. p.109.
10 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
Living room, showing curved screen entrance and bar / dining area to the right28
There is further ironic commentary on the contemporary obsession with machine imagery. Gray used Corbusian stencilling to caption the house for the uninitiated: in the entrance, “Défense de rire" and "Entrez lentement"29. This wasn’t just a poke in the eye to the speed of the machine age – it was also a genuine warning that the circulation through E.1027 requires consideration as there is more than just one route.
Guest bedroom at E.1027
28 Wilson, p.114. 29 Adam, p.199.
11 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
The living room also acted as a bar, a dining area and a wardrobe, and separated two bedrooms – the master bedroom to the east and the guest alcove bedroom and shower room to the west, and highlights an essential point of the design:
The problem of the independence of the rooms: everyone, even in a small house, must be able to remain free, independent. There must be still the impression of being alone, and if desired, entirely alone.30 As well as being orientated away from each other, the rooms each have their own balconies and direct access to the garden. Services are located to the north east, away from the main public space. Internally, there is virtually no wasted space ‐ fittings merge harmoniously with the interior, allowing possessions to be stowed away out of sight. The interior merges with the exterior and the exterior is respectful of its location.
A spiral staircase links the living room with the roof terrace and outdoor kitchen to the maid’s / children’s quarters on the ground floor, where there is another bathroom and storage area.
Not being a mother herself, and never marrying, Gray mentally relegated children to the undercroft area with her maid, Louise. It is interesting that despite her awareness of social issues, the ‘upstairs / downstairs’ mentality and ‘children should be seen and not heard' of her childhood is still very much in evidence in E.102731. Indeed, the only constant criticism of E.1027 is the kitchen, which was little more than a galley32 – largely because Gray herself never used it.
30 Heckler & Muller, p.60. 31 Adam, p.215. 32 Ibid, p.215.
12 Eileen Gray & E.1027 – Living with Ghosts: Tranquillity & Tragedy Ralph Kent wsa ii
Contemporary criticism of E.1027 During 1937, Corbusier frequented E.1027 numerous times for tea with his wife, Yvonne. Corbusier probably admired E.1027 as it was “free of any over intellectualising approach”33 or high concept. It was just a house in which to enjoy the pleasure of living. He wrote of the house:
I am so happy to tell you how much those few days spent in your house have made me appreciate the rare spirit which dictates all the organisation, inside and outside. A rare spirit which has given the modern furniture and installations such a dignified, charming, and witty shape.34 Happy times at E.1027 – Corbusier, his wife Yvonne and Badovici35
Gray was enormously proud of this: Corbusier was acknowledging that it was the house she had built. However, at the same time, her relationship with Badovici was becoming difficult, so they parted.
Despite the admiration of Corbusier, and a whole issue of Architecture Vivante dedicated to E.1027, coupled with photographs of it displayed in the Union des Artistes Modernes, the property went virtually unnoticed by the French press. One of the reasons for this was the anti‐modernist backlash during the Great Depression. Modernism’s lack of decoration was
33 Adam, p.220. 34 Ibid, p.220. 35 Caroline Constant, Eileen Gray, (London: Phaidon Press, 2000), p.123.
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viewed as de‐humanising and its industrial construction methods a threat to artisanal crafts during a period of already high unemployment36.
Contemporary critical acknowledgement was also hampered by the number of simultaneous Modernist houses and villas by higher profile, established architects. 1929 also saw the unveiling of Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, Neutra’s Lovell House and the Barcelona Pavilion, shortly followed by Chareau’s Maison de Verre. The limited coverage E.1027 did receive by advocates of Modernism described E.1027 as “disquieting”, as it was seen as one of the first buildings to challenge the spread of formalism37.
In 1938, a strange thing happened that caused Gray’s relationship with Corbusier to turn sour. Corbusier arrived at E.1027, stripped naked and started painting the blank white walls with eight overtly sexual murals in what Gray called "an act of vandalism". He had not sought Gray's permission and it was an act she deeply resented. Five of these paintings still remain today, even after occupation by German and Italian troops during World War II when they were used for target practise.
Corbusier painting murals on the walls of E.1027 in the nude38
In August 1956 Badovici died, and, during a retrospective for his work in Paris, he was credited with the design of E.1027, with Gray only recognised for the furniture design. Despite knowing the house’s true authorship, Corbusier did nothing to dispel this misinformation, perhaps in order to preserve the house complete with his frescoes? Having failed to purchase E.1027 himself, he went on only to increase Gray’s anxiety by building a cabana ‐ La Baraque ‐ next to E.1027. It is testimony to Corbusier’s obsession with E.1027 that he died swimming off Roquebrune. The path above where his body was found has been
36 Constant & Wang, p.32. 37 Wilson, p.109. 38 Ibid, p.121.
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renamed Promenade Le Corbusier, and thus, even in death, Corbusier’s legacy looks down on Gray’s house.
E.1027’s creation and reputation were intrinsically tied to Corbusier. His failure to highlight Gray’s contribution to E.1027’s design and her limited output of other work, coupled with her reclusiveness, meant that during her lifetime, Gray’s architectural work was largely overlooked. It was only brought back into the public eye in 1968 following an article in Domus, and then again in 1972 when an auction of her furniture attained a considerable sum.
Overlooked and abandoned – E.1027 after Badovici’s death For four years after Badovici’s death, E.1027 languished. The heir to the property was his sister in Romania. Eventually, Corbusier, not wishing to drive the price up by bidding himself, contacted a buyer in Switzerland – Marie‐Louise Schelbert ‐ who, despite the declining state of the building purchased E.1027 at an auction in Menton in 1960. Controversy surrounded the auction as Schelbert wasn’t the highest bidder, but Corbusier had spoken with the auctioneer behind closed doors to ensure she secured the purchase. Gray was unable to visit E.1027 to even reclaim her furniture and never visited the house again.
In 1980, Schelbert died – some believe suspiciously – and Heinz Peter Kägi – who claimed Schelbert had sold him the property in 1974, moved in. He stripped the house of Gray’s furniture and sold it at auction, and the property rapidly fell into a state of disrepair, becoming, according to some reports, a den of orgies and drugs. In yet another tragic turn for the history of E.1027, Kägi was stabbed to death in the living room of E.1027 by vagrant garden labourers in a dispute over wages.
Following Kägi’s death, squatters moved in, only accelerating the decay – although remarkably the Corbusier frescoes remain intact. E.1027 is now protected as a historic monument after classification by the French Government in 1998 – largely because of, ironically, Corbusier’s frescoes. Had the frescoes not been there, it is likely that E.1027 would have been allowed to deteriorate until collapse.
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Conclusion E.1027 represents the embodiment of Gray’s life, and a rejection of some of the austerity of her childhood, a throwback to that photo of her first childhood home. She was fortunate that her financial independence and strong spirit allowed her to commit herself absolutely to a few projects, which she saw through passionately from start to finish. There is no better example of this than E.1027 ‐ thoughtful, practical, isolated, private, and all the more beautiful for it.
E.1027 was designed from inside out, not something primarily to be looked upon with the comfort of its occupants as a secondary consideration, as was the case with the majority of contemporary Modernist dwellings. The design goes beyond the sterility of a purely intellectual response and conveys the instinctive emotional response of its creator to the site and its owner’s needs: “formulas are nothing; life is everything”39. If it is to be criticised, it is on the grounds that given its location and intended user, it is hard to genuinely see E.1027 as a template for social housing, particularly with the tiny kitchen and staff quarters.
It is built sympathetically to the topography of the site, and maximises the views to the Mediterranean, whilst remaining adaptable to the changing of the seasons. The inbuilt furniture forces the inhabitant to limit their possessions, whilst the external form could not be a more pertinent legacy to its creator – a ship ‐ an independent spirit ‐ generally accustomed to sailing her own way that has finally found a welcoming port in which to berth. It is unfortunate that such a humane and cheerful house has ended up being the source of such sadness and tragedy.
39 Adam, p.225.
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Bibliography • Adam, Peter, Eileen Gray Architect Designer, (New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc., revised edition 2000) • Baudet, Francois, Eileen Gray, (London: Thames & Hudson, 1998) • Cleaver, Naomi, Eileen Gray, hosted by Channel 4