Walter Gropius and his wife Ise arrived in Britain in October 1934, having fled Germany via Rome as the Nazi’s rise to power made his stay in his homeland impossible. Since 1919 he had been the master of the Bauhaus design school, an institution that aimed to unify artistic expression alongside 20th century functionalism and mass production, with artists such as Paul Klee, Laszlo Mohloy-Nagy and Wassily Kandinsky. Gropius was also an architect in his own right, designing early modernist buildings such as the Fagus factory in 1911 and the new school building for the Bauhaus when it relocated to Dessau in 1925. He had gone into private practice in 1928 but received little in the way of commissions as he was seen as a ‘degenerate’ designer. The British architect Maxwell Fry, who had befriended Gropius on an earlier trip to Britain, arranged for Gropius to visit a conference in Italy and escape to Britain. Walter and Ise were lent a flat at the recently completed Isokon Building by Jack Pritchard, who with his wife Molly had commissioned the building from Wells Coates, and the Pritchard’s were interested in working with Gropius. He then joined Fry in partnership, a move that was replicated with other emigre architects joining a British cohort, see also Serge Chermayeff and Erich Mendelsohn. The two architects tended to design their subsequent projects individually, with the other partner used as a sounding board, although all projects during the 2 and a half years of Gropius' stay were credited to Fry & Gropius. Gropius' short stay and the relatively conservative nature of British architecture meant that the German architect only completed a few schemes during his time in London. Two of these completed projects would be private houses; 66 Old Street in Chelsea (1935) for MP and writer Benn Levy, and The Wood House in Shipbourne, Kent (1937) for Jack Donaldson (who would also later become an MP). The house in Chelsea was a fairly straightforward International Style modernist design, with a three storey house constructed of brick around a steel frame faced with white render. Viewed from the street the house looks fairly small, but it was designed to accommodate Levy and his wife actress Constance Cummings, their three children, a butler and two maids, all fitted in with careful planning. Unfortunately since the late 1940s the house has undergone successive transformations, first split into two homes then covered in tile hanging. The house in Kent is more intriguing, constructed with a timber frame and finished in cedar cladding. The design pointed the way to houses Gropius would produce in the US, such as the house for himself in Lincoln, Massachusetts. Elsewhere he contributed to film studios in Denham, Buckinghamshire for Alexander Korda in 1936, designing the three storey office and laboratory buildings at the front of the complex. The buildings are built in concrete with flat roofs, and feature metal windows and railings. The studio ceased production in 1952, with the site rented out by the US Air Force then the Rank Organisation. Most Of the studio buildings were demolished from the 1970s, but Gropius’ buildings were listed and have now been turned into apartments. Gropius is also credited with helping design the Mortimer Gall Electrical Showrooms in Cannon St EC4, with its curved frontage of glass and black vitrolite. The interior was fitted out with a range of light fittings set amongst metal and timber fixtures. Maxwell Fry had designed a number of electricity showrooms so it is not known how much of the design was his and how much was by Gropius. Gropius’ most significant work in Britain was not completed until three years after his departure in 1937. Impington Village College in Cambridgeshire was one of a number of these establishments, the brainchild of local Chief Education Officer Henry Morris, which provided education for those between 11-16, as well as community facilities for the wider population. The scheme that Gropius devised from Morris’s earlier plan has a long concourse building connected to a two storey classroom block at one end and an adult block at the other. It is constructed of yellow and red brick with lots of glazing, pale blue tiling and concrete door canopies. After Gropius departed in 1937, Jack Howe took over the detailing and the college was opened in 1939. Despite being feted by the relatively small modernist architectural community, Gropius found gaining commissions difficult. Two unrealized projects illustrate the conservative nature shared by both the planning committees and wider population of the time. A project on St Leonards Hill, Windsor for Jack Pritchard, with the working title “Isokon 3” was developed in 1935. Featuring 70 flats and a hotel on a site overlooking Windsor Castle. King George V had apparently given permission for it to be built, but the funds could not be raised. A similarly prestigious site was to be the venue for another Gropius design, Christ College in Cambridge. He had been asked to present alternative designs to Oswald P. Milne’s proposals for a new building on Hobson Street, but the new design lost the vote by the college's fellows, and Gropius left for the US 10 days later. Gropius had successfully applied for permission to stay in Britain permanently in June 1936, but the lack of work and what he saw in the country as a “general cluelessness and lack of artistic ability”, meant that when he received an invitation to chair the Department of Architecture in the Graduate School of Design at Harvard, he accepted. Gropius stayed at Harvard until 1952, and formed a short-lived partnership with fellow Bauhaus alumni Marcel Breuer (who also had a brief period in Britain), and later joined The Architects Collaborative practice. Gropius did later help design another building in London, 45 Park Lane, an office block that was later home to the Playboy Club. It was built for developer Jack Cotton in 1963, with Gropius enlisted to produce a design for the facade after the initial building was produced by architects Cotton, Ballard and Blow, with the German architect replacing the original Portland stone with concrete. Gropius passed away on July 5th 1969 in Boston, aged 86.
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