Style-Architecture and Building-Art: Transformations of Architecture in the Nineteenth Century and Its Present Condition

Hermann MuthesiusIntroduction and translation by Stanford Anderson Style-Architecture and Building-Art (1902) is Hermann Muthesius's trenchant manifesto on early European Modernism. Now published for the first time in English, this classic study followed in the wake of Otto Wagner's Modern Architecture (1896) and reinforced the latter's exhortations with its vigorous plea for realism and simplicity in design. Although Muthesius (1861–1927) was an architect by training, he is best known for his stay in London as a cultural attaché to the German Embassy and for his subsequent advocacy of the English house. Muthesius wrote prolifically on architectural themes throughout his career, but in the few years surrounding the publication of Style-Architecture and Building-Art, he advanced upon the critical scene as a courageous and astute fighter for architectural reform, inspiring the formation of the German Werkbund. Many other beliefs of Modernist historiography are foreshadowed in Muthesius'