Was it just the way the world was back then, or did Ludwig Mies van der Rohe really snub the woman responsible for his most famous works? Or did she give him credit on purpose because she knew she couldn’t get recognition on her own? From the Barcelona Pavilion to the Tugendhat House, Lilly Reich has been swept under the carpet by her partner – the pioneer of modernist architecture. But was he really the mastermind behind the international style?
“A marriage between art and technology” – How Ludwig Mies van der Rohe described his International style. This movement is Mies’ life’s work, or is it? It all started in 1925, after Lilly Reich joined the Deutscher Werkbund hoping to help improve Germany’s competitiveness in the industrial market. Here she met the Vice President – Mr Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, a man whose ties with the art world were extensive through various apprenticeships and brushing shoulders with legends. Their relationship - both personal and professional - went on for thirteen years, spanning many different projects, including the world-renowned Barcelona Pavilion. Their work has sculpted the way we look at architecture and many architecture scholars worship the pair’s creations whether they be furniture or structures. While they were working together, she moved from Frankfurt to Berlin to be with him in 1926, this proves how committed she was to him.
In 1929, they both became the artistic directors for the German contribution to the Barcelona World Exposition, giving birth to The German Pavilion. A vision of a modern apartment only built to last for eight months. Taking inspiration from Roman architecture and stripping it back to its basic form. The pair also designed other buildings and exhibitions for this event, including a tower for the textile arts which used space to emphasize the different displays and how we should look at them. But this the pavilion was so radical and experimental it has outlived its creators even after being demolished. It was recreated in 1980 using photographs of the original that Mies himself commissioned. But why was it rebuilt? In 1980 Spain was on the rebound after a long-lasting dictatorship. A dictator who stripped the nation of its identity and eventually it’s pride.
Germany at the time of the exposition was recovering from the toll of World War One. This restricted Mies and Reich’s designs because the budget and time constraints were so tight. The site once given to Mies up by the centre of the exhibition, was too central. He wanted people to flow freely through the building not just to marvel at it but to experience it on another level. To almost trick people into having to walk through the interior to reach the staircase leading to the palace. “It became an exhibit about exhibition. All it exhibited was a new way of looking.” The reflections of the pavilion also help the visitor get lost in their journey as it tricks the eye using light. The approach to architecture is revolutionary: a building without function but dedicated to representation.
“It became an exhibit about exhibition. All it exhibited was a new way of looking.”
The “MR” chair (1927) a tubular cantilever chair, patented so Mies could continue his work after the Bauhaus without worrying about pay. This funded most of his work until he left Germany. The MR chairs were shown both in the Stuttgart Werbund Exhibition, and in the Exposition de la Mode in Paris, 1927. But where is Reich at this time when the chair is patented? She hardly gets credit for this chair. She had the idea to cane the chair’s seat. Other names are mentioned for contributing, like Mart Stam and Marcel Breuer. Is it because she was a woman only destined for simple, mundane work?
Mies offered Reich a job in 1932 at the Bauhaus to teach Interior Design. A year later, the school was closed due to the Nazis viewing the school’s work as “degenerative” and “probably influenced by Jews.” This didn’t stop her from designing, she traded textiles through the war from her small studio-turned-shop.
In 1939, Reich briefly visited Mies in America but returned soon after to continue working at her studio which was bombed in 1943. She was captured and was subjected to work in a German forced labour camp in World War Two for two years. Once the war was over, she started working at the Universitat der Kunste where she fell ill, had to resign and died soon after. Lilly Reich tragically only become famous after her death, and only got recognition for her work then too.
“It became more than a coincidence that Mies’s involvement and success in exhibition design began at the same time as his personal relationship with Reich... It is interesting to note that Mies did not fully develop any contemporary furniture successfully before or after his collaboration with Reich.” - Albert Pfeiffer, Vice President of Design and Management at Knoll
Had she given him credit for her work on purpose? To live on after she dies, or to change the world and give form and meaning to the machine-made things like what the international style aspired to achieve. We will never know. Artists from this time were out to explore Gesamtkultur, a concept to help achieve structural honesty and promote the man-made/machine-made industry. Did she use this theory as her way to finally help the world achieve creative clarity? Fortunately, her name is now known by some artist and designers and she is starting to get recognised for her impact on 20th century design. The Mies van der Rohe Foundation have named an award after Reich which is a grant for raising the profile of the contributions in architecture which have been forgotten, made by professionals who have suffered bias due to their personal status.
Women are still unequal to men. But we’re still fighting for freedom.
The pavilion is a symbol for masking the past or broken relationships. This can be seen in both Germany and Mies. Germany used this pavilion to try to fix the events of the war and try to make friends with Europe again. The skeletons in Mies’ closet are his young family and wife which he left in 1918, presumably to focus solely on his work and the relationship he had with Lily Reich. Nowhere is it seen in any history books and it is rarely seen in some of his biographies. It makes you think why he pushes people away. Money or fame? Maybe, but this leads to his demise.
Was the American dream for Mies worth it if it meant pushing everyone away? He died alone following a lengthy battle with oesophageal cancer in 1969. In his adopted home of Chicago. People were clearly never the main focus of his life; it was always his buildings with their steel skeletons and glass curtains but we can see what he has to hide.
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