10 Modern Styles: 1930-40
At the peak of the Period Revival's popularity, the American public received a glimpse of a new kind of architecture, an architecture that rejected historicism. The new architecture, as it was called by its European pioneers, soon became known in this country as "modern architecture." Its American premier was not without controversy. The first glimpses came in the form of a number of European entrants to the 1922 Chicago Tribune Tower competition. The architects of these designs siezed the opportunity to apply their theories of modern design to that uniquely American building type—the skyscraper. The winning design, however, was a tower in the Gothic Revival style, and the influence of the modern European designs was not assimilated into American architecture for almost a decade. By 1923, one of the foreign entrants in the competition, Eliel Saarinen, had permanently settled in the United States. The same year also saw the immigration of a young Viennese architect, Richard Neutra, to southern California. Before the decade ended, Neutra's design for Dr. Lovell's Health House in the Hollywood Hills presented America with its first major residence in the International style of modern architecture. In Europe, a number of significant events took place during the 1920s that affected the future of modern design. Architect Walter Gropius founded the Bauhaus, a new school of design in Germany, in the early 1920s. By 1926 a new school facility designed by Gropius became symbolic of both the new architecture and the school's philosophy. In 1925 Paris hosted the Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes, from the title of which the popular Art Deco style was derived. The 1927 League of Nations Competition also brought to public attention a number of modern European architects, in particular the French-Swiss Le Corbusier, who had previously been known for his elegant, modem country villas. Also in 1927, his work and the work of
Fig. 303: International Style house, c. 1938, St. George, Washington County. The flat roof, smooth stucco surface, and asymmetrical massing of this residence is indicative of the new or modern architecture that began to appear in the second quarter of this century. This International Style design is also characterized by the use of metal sash and double cantilevered corner windows. a number of other modern European architects appeared at the highly influential housing settlement of Weissenhofsiedlung in Stuttgart, Germany. Sponsored by the German Werkbund, it was the first major exhibition of modern architecture in Europe. By the end of the 1920s America had become more familiar with modern architecture. Neutra's unique steel-framed Lovell house had been completed and the planning of architects Howe and Lescaze for the Philadelphia Savings Fund Society Building, America's first Internationa] Style skyscraper, was well under way. But it was not until the following 169
