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BREUER, MARCEL 1902-1981

ARCHITECT

Modernist Architect

Hungarian American architect Marcel Breuer had been a student and a faculty member at the Bauhaus in Germany before arriving in the United States in 1937 to join Walter Gropius on the faculty of Harvard University. Breuer's work embodied many elements of fine architecture. He combined traditional wood and brick with newer materials such as concrete and metal. A modernist, Breuer emphasized in his designs the structure and form characteristic of the International Style and played an important role in establishing the style in the United States.

From Germany to America

Breuer was born in Pécs, Hungary, in 1902. After graduating from secondary school in 1920, he enrolled in the Bauhaus, which was founded by Gropius in Dessau, Germany. In 1924 Breuer received his degree and joined the faculty as a master of carpentry, remaining there until 1928. While at the Bauhaus, Breuer designed several modern chairs and other furniture employing bent, tubular steel frames. In 1928 Breuer and Gropius left the Bauhaus to form their own practice, which survived the international depression of the 1930s and the rising cultural control of the Nazi regime. In 1935 they left Germany for London; two years later they moved to the United States. Breuer kept his post at Harvard University until 1941. The following year he organized his own practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, then moved to New York in 1946.

On His Own

Breuer designed houses and other residential buildings throughout the 1940s. Among his most notable houses are the Aluminum City Terrace Housing buildings (1942) in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, the Geller House (1945) in Lawrence, New York, and the Robinson House (1947) in Williams town, Massachusetts. In 1946 he designed and constructed a house in the garden of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which brought him to the attention of architects and the general public. He soon received commissions for other houses and for larger buildings.

Later Career

Notable buildings by Breuer include the Ferry Cooperative dormitory at Vassar College, in Poughkeepsie, New York (1951); the UNESCO headquarters in Paris (1958), designed in association with Pier Luigi Nervi and Bernard Zehrfuss; the IBM building in La Gaude, France (1962); the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York (1966); and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development building in Washington, D.C. (1967). In 1968 he received the highest award of the American Institute of Architects, the Gold Medal. He retired in 1977 and died in 1981.