Building high with 20th-century materials

Le Corbueier was the name adopted by Charles Edouard Jean-neret, born at la Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, in 1887. He trained as a designer-engraver at the local art school and went on to become one of the most influential figures in 20th-century ar­chitecture.

The most powerful advocate of the modernist architectural school, he believed that in the machine age housing must be functional, or utilitarian. "A house is a machine for living in," he said. He pro-

duced undecorated buildings modeled on factory architecture, de­spite his professed fascination with the "ceaseless inexhaustible miracle of proportion."

Le Corbusier studied in Paris, with August Perret pioneer of
building in reinforced concrete. There Le Corbusier learned the
techniques of reinforced concrete that he was to employ so fre­
quently. Then he worked with his cousin Pierre Jeanneret, de­
signing such buildings
as the five-story Swiss
pavilion at the Univer­
sity of Paris, made of
concrete and raised on
stilts. His design for the
Ville Contemporaine, a
town for three million
people, was never built,
but it inspired other
architects with its pe-
A Sacred Task Le Corbusier's pilgrimage destrian walkways, roof
chapel at Ronchamp, Vosges, France, com- gardens, courtyards,
pleted in 1952, is his most unconventional ^elevated highways, and
work. Its thick roof hangs over the white walls, ^recreation areas- His
producing remarkable acustic effects. The tow- P^re"World War II work
ers act as funnels for light and the irregularly ^is self-contained and
placed windows contain stained glass. A strip of abstract, showing clas-
stained glass also runs along the very top of the ^{sical influence}. but his
walls, causing lines of light to climb and de- ^{late work shows more}
scend the interior walls as the sun moves across ^{lnterest in} the envi-
the sky. ronment.

His Unite d'Habitation in Marseille is a 17-story residential block built on stilts and de­signed to blend with the mountain background. Other projects in­clude the town of Chandigarh, Punjab, India, built to replace La­hore- lost through partition in 1947. Chandigarh is only a partial success because it is not sufficiently adapted to Indian customs. Le Corbusier built to heights unknown in Europe for domestic ar­chitecture and was a powerful influence on the building of high-

rise dwellings in postwar Europe. Although he was a pioneer in the use of modern materials, his buildings have been criticized, chiefly for the isolation they impose on their inhabitants.

Exercises