Essay | Light Architecture Part 1: Origins - Europe 1900-1945

Download project PDF
14/10/2024 - Light and architecture have been profoundly related since the beginning of time. This relationship, beginning with the light emanating from the hearth and the cave dwelling, has comprised a deeper and much more integral interdependence than is frequently understood. Light and its expression through the art and architecture of a particular time and place has represented the philosophy of specific society, geographic location, as well as the deeper beliefs of society as a whole. - James Brogan

Introduction

“Light and architecture have been profoundly related since the beginning of time. This relationship, beginning with the light emanating from the hearth and the cave dwelling, has comprised a deeper and much more integral interdependence than is frequently understood. Light and its expression through the art and architecture of a particular time and place has represented the philosophy of specific society, geographic location, as well as the deeper beliefs of society as a whole.” - James Brogan


The story of light and architecture is well-known and universal. When told it is often about the way that sunlight and daylight changes form, defines space, reveals surfaces, and creates the experience of a building. What is often overlooked however, is what happens when darkness falls, and our built environment becomes reliant on light created by mankind rather than the sun.


Whilst over the centuries we have found ways to meet our basic need for light after dark - to be able to see and stay safe - until less than two hundred years ago this was through the use of torches, candles and lanterns fuelled by oil, tallow or beeswax. It was only with the development of industrialised light in the 19th century, first through gas and then electricity, that technology allowed the illumination of architecture to move beyond the purely functional; to also become a means of expression.


We now live in an age where our cities and towns, and the buildings within them, ‘never sleep’: They have become twenty-four-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week places where we continuously work, rest and play. As a result, many of us spend as much time experiencing architecture under artificial light as we do by the light of the sun. Some of us more. By example a report by the Greater London Assembly’s ‘London Night-Time Commission’ in 2019 found that over 1.6 million people work in that city during the hours of darkness.


That means for our contemporary society the lighting of both buildings, and the public realm between them, is critical to our social interaction, economic success and personal well-being. For electric light doesn’t only allow us to see, but also to feel. It is an ephemeral but essential tool that directly contributes to the identity and character of our cities and towns and their architecture. Whilst its use comes with environmental consequences such as energy use, light pollution, adverse impacts on biodiversity and waste, the genie is out of the bottle: Our civilisation as we know it would struggle without electric light. Buildings need lighting and that in turn shapes the way we use and experience them.


And whilst the external and internal lighting of buildings now goes by many names – architectural lighting, luminous architecture, the architecture of the night – perhaps the most important of them all is ‘light architecture’, for as this first article in a series will show, it underlines that lighting design can be elevated to become a philosophy - a way of integrating lighting into built form such that its “space creating potential is the primary determinant…that light explains the architecture” 

In the beginning

“The spectacular illumination of architecture in the twentieth century has a long pre-history. Since the Renaissance, public and private festivals in Europe often included architectural illumination and fireworks at night.” - Dietrich Neumann


Artificial light has been employed beyond the purely functional since the dawn of time. In ancient civilisations it often played a ceremonial role as part of religious rites, from the revelation of cave paintings by flickering firelight to the focal glow of the candlelit altars of the early Christian church. The extensive lighting of the grand royal courts of Europe and the magical illuminations of theatres and opera houses that arose from the Renaissance, demonstrate that lighting has long been used to create ‘effect’. In most cases however the history of architecture generally bears witness to the ‘application’ of light rather than its ‘integration’.


Whilst the art of illuminating the built environment is nothing new - buildings, public spaces, parks, and gardens all have a long history of being lit in beautiful or spectacular ways - due to the limits of technology and cost such schemes were rarely permanent. Examples range from the temporary highlighting of the dome of St. Peter’s in Rome with candles in the mid-16th century to the famous Georgian ‘illumination nights’ in London in the late 1700’s “when every building of importance and many private residences were fully lit up”


Whilst such instances used ‘flame’, with all the inherent risks that brought such as fire and smoke damage, and notwithstanding the progress made through the more effective delivery of lighting systems through coal gas which allowed architects to experiment with the placement and design of light fixtures, it was only with the development of electric light by Joseph Swann, Thomas Alvar Edison and other mid-19th century pioneers, that more permanent, integrated, creative architectural expression became possible after dark.


The potential was perhaps first demonstrated on a large scale through the illumination of both exhibits and pavilions at the great international fairs of that era such as the Paris World’s Fair of 1889 and the World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago in 1893, where the likes of Edison showcased their nascent electric lighting technologies. Of particular note at both was the Edison Company’s ‘Electric Tower’, also known as the ‘Tower of Light’. It must have seemed incredible for its time:

“The shaft of the tower was illuminated by thousands of coloured incandescent light bulbs supplied by the Edison Company. The bulbs were mechanically controlled and could be flashed in harmony with accompanying music. Like the Edison pavilion at the Paris Exhibition of 1889, the apex of the tower consisted of a replica of a giant Edison incandescent light bulb. However, unlike the Paris example, this model was constructed from approximately 30,000 prismatic crystals that were illuminated from within.” 


Whilst ultimately dedicated to promotion such early displays started to see the integration of artificial lighting into structures as part of a design idea rather than simply as cosmetic addition.


As a result of this rapid development of electric lighting two strong traditions of ‘architectural light’ emerged in the early 1900’s:


The first, which was more associated with the development of the American city, is often referred to as the ‘architecture of the night’. This tended towards the external illumination of landmark buildings, particularly skyscrapers, with the lighting being more ‘applied’ through outlining or floodlighting. Many buildings associated with this form were of solid construction where windows formed distinct apertures in a façade.

The second, which started in Germany, ‘light architecture’ (Lichtarchitektur), was a more holistic approach where artificial light was highly integrated into the form and structure of the building from the outset of the design and one in which the interior lighting also often played a crucial role in creating the external image of the building at night. This was particularly the case where the façade was transparent or translucent supported by a lightweight steel or concrete frame.


With both paradigms, the result was not only functional. It was also about creating a lit image for architecture, usually within an urban context, and in both cases the desire for illumination was often driven by commercial concerns such as advertising, the presence of the building, and its occupier. However, given the radical transformation of lighting technology in the last twenty years through the development of light emitting diodes and digital control that allows lighting to be built into the very structure and fabric of a building at a highly detailed level, ‘light architecture’ can be seen as the most relevant to the future of the two approaches. 

A new term is born

"Actually, every work of architecture is designed and calculated for a specific lighting. Therefore - if you like – ‘Lichtarchitektur’. We should really speak of the artificial light architecture, and this could be defined as follows: Artificial light architecture is architecture that has been designed in conjunction with a specific lighting system, together with the whole building and appropriately constructed." - Louis Christian Klaff, Kunstlicht und Architektur (Artificial Light and Architecture) 1943


Whilst the Dutch architect and lighting designer L.C. Klaff’s observations come close to providing a meaningful definition of ‘light architecture’, they perhaps should go further: As we will see, ‘light architecture’ can be described as being the total and seamless integration of artificial light into the design of a building such that provides its expression after dark whilst at the same time meeting the functional needs of its users. Not only is the building conceived in light, but its form and materiality is directly influenced and transformed by light such that it becomes a fundamental part of the building’s composition.


The term ‘light architecture’ first came to prominence in 1926 through a well-known lighting German engineer Joachim Teichmüller. At the time he was the chair of that country’s first institute for lighting technology at the University of Karlsruhe Teichmüller famously wrote ‘Lichtarchitektur’ in huge letters on the wall of an exhibition he curated that examined the psychological effects of light on people at the Exposition of Health Care, Social Welfare and Physical Education in Düsseldorf. In the following year he published an article in the magazine ‘Licht and Lampe’ that explored ‘The Architecture of Light’. He started with the statement: “It is the architect's responsibility, aware of the space-shaping power of light (and shadow), to adopt the means that modern artificial light offers him for this purpose.” Throughout the piece Teichmüller outlines an approach to artificial lighting that is based on its ability to transform space and form. He ends with a reminder that “we do not illuminate in order to see – that is what the art of lighting does – but in order to create – that is what the architecture of light does.” 


However, whilst Teichmüller is often credited with the term, the architectural historian Dietrich Neumann suggests it was actually coined two decades earlier:

“Whilst Teichmüller had not invented the term ‘Lichtarchitektur’ (as he seemed to believe) he popularised it in the exclusive sense of artificial, controllable light. The utopian writer Paul Scheerbart first had introduced the term in 1906 in his novel “Munchausen and Clarissa”, describing imaginary festival lighting in the night sky high above a world’s fair”.


Either way, whilst such thinking is familiar to us today, in that the concept was defined relatively soon after the realisation of viable, widely available electric lighting systems, it may be seen as an idea that was advanced for its time.

From 'glass Architecture' to 'light Architecture'

“In order to raise our culture to a higher level, we are forced, whether we like it or not, to change our architecture. And this will be possible only if we free the rooms in which we live of their enclosed character. This, however, we can only do by introducing a glass architecture, which admits the light of the sun, of the moon, and of the stars into the rooms, not only through a few windows, but through as many walls as feasible, these to consist entirely of glass – of coloured glass.” - Paul Scheerbart, Glasarchitektur.


Notwithstanding when or where the term ‘Lichtarchitektur’ emanated, the integration of electric light into built form as a means of expression had certainly been examined by Scheerbart as early as 1914 through his revolutionary speculative literature. His book, ‘Glasarchitektur’ (Glass Architecture) published in Berlin in that year, was a manifesto which advocated moving from the more solid buildings of the past to ones that were transparent, translucent, and above all highly coloured – and in which light played a central role.


Whilst his treatise was focussed on the many possibilities afforded by new glass technologies by day, he also thought about the experience of the architecture at night. He wrote about double-glazed walls set a metre apart which incorporate artificial light that shines both outward and inward. As Scheerbart suggested; “With this type of lighting the whole glass house becomes a big lantern.” He went further in proposing that structural elements such as columns should be clad in glass and internally illuminated to allow them to dematerialise. At the larger urban scale, he suggested that “Under the rule of glass architecture, therefore, all towers must become towers of light”. Indeed, a good deal of ‘Glasarchitektur’ focused on the transformation of the nightscape into a dramatic composition of light and colour created by glowing coloured glass buildings, towers that floodlit parks with coloured light, and aircraft and airships with coloured projectors. Scheerbart even acknowledged the environmental impact of such moves in admitting that “Astronomers will erect their observatories in quiet mountain ravines and on peaks, because the huge sea of coloured light may disturb the study of the heavens”.


Although many of Scheerbart’s ideas may have been impractical, or the technology required to realise them too advanced for that time, a single, experimental, prismatic glass pavilion that followed many of his core principles was designed and delivered by the young German architect Bruno Taut for the Deutscher Werkbund Exhibition in Cologne in the same year the book was published. Whilst the structure drew upon an earlier pavilion designed for the ‘Steel Industries’ at the Leipzig Fair the year before, the ‘Glashaus’ as it is often referred to, was a far more radical proposition.


Taut wrote at the time "The Glashaus has no purpose other than to be beautiful” and as the architectural historian Dennis Sharp’s description suggests – it was:

“It was a glass building throughout, glass walls-glass prisms in a concrete frame-glass doors, and glass staircases. The building was erected on a curved concrete apron and was basically a space frame dome resting on a fourteen-sided drum of glass bricks. On the string-course between the drum and dome were inscribed the Scheerbart aphorisms. The formal entrance staircase cut into the concrete podium (cf. the entrance to Mendelsohn's Einstein Tower, 1919-21) and led into the lower part of the building and to the sparkling water cascade that formed the central feature of the building. The polychromatic interior was divided in two at the base of the dome, the upper portion being entered from the staircases on either side of the building. The dome itself was many-faceted, each one of its rhomboid shapes filled in with Luxfer prisms faced on the inside with coloured glass and on the outside with clear plate glass panes. The total effect was heightened internally by a kaleidoscope that threw its coloured light on the running water, and by the translucence of the paintings on glass that were let into the wall surface; these paintings were based on designs by Jan Thorn-Prikker, Max Pechstein, Emanuel Josef Margold and Fritz Bekker.


It should perhaps come as no surprise that Taut’s ideas were highly influenced by Scheerbart as the two were great friends and collaborators. Scheerbart was 50 years old when the Glashaus was realised. Taut was only 32. The former had dedicated ‘Glasarchitektur’ to him. They also worked together on the project, with the author’s poetry and statements adorning the main interior frieze using idealistic phrases such as ‘light wants crystal’, ‘we feel sorry for the brick culture’, and ‘coloured glass destroys hatred’. Some sources even credit Scheerbart with the design of the light fittings within the pavilion, the technology for which was supplied by the lighting company Osram.


As the architectural historian Kenneth Frampton observes the pavilion was steeped in symbolism:

“According to Taut this crystalline structure…had been designed in the spirit of a Gothic cathedral. It was in fact a Stadkrone or ‘city crown’, that pyramidal form postulated by Taut as the universal paradigm of all religious building, which together with the faith that it would inspire was an essential urban element for the restructuring of society.” 


Even though there may be no direct evidence that Taut, and his contemporaries saw the glass pavilion a direct example of ‘Licharchitektur’ many of Scheerbart’s principles around artificial light were incorporated into the design. This not only included the suspended pendant lights at the apex of the coloured glass dome that would make it glow externally at night, but also atmospheric lighting within the internal fountain and cascade and the inclusion of a kaleidoscope set within a darkened space that projected moving colour onto a frosted glass screen - the last thing to be experienced by visitors before exiting.


Perhaps more importantly than the detail of the ‘Glashaus’ is the impact that this small, highly coloured, temporary structure had on the development of modern architecture: Despite its transitory nature, it went on to be regarded as one of the seminal pre-war buildings that inspired the work of a generation of architects who laid the foundations of the development of lightweight glass, steel and concrete structures which dominate our cities and towns today. Such buildings in turn made ‘light architecture’ more possible.

An idea spreads

“Night architecture is something more than a transient phase or a mere stunt. It is a definite type of modern design with immense possibilities for beautifying our cities, which is opening up entirely new and untrammelled perspectives of architectural composition." - P. Morton Shand.


If the foundations of ‘glass architecture’ were laid by the collaboration of Scheerbart and Taut the idea of ‘light architecture’ seemed to develop as part of Expressionism, and in particular the work of members of Die Gläserne Kette (The Glass Chain), a group of influential architects that not only included Bruno Taut and his brother Max but also other well-known designers including Walter Gropius, Hans Scharoun, Hermann Finsterlin, and Wassili and Hans Luckhardt.


The Glass Chain was the remnant of a 50-strong collective of artists, architects and their patrons called the ‘Arbeitsrat für Kunst’ (Workers Council for Art) founded in 1918, which was quickly disbanded after the crushing of the ‘Sparticus Uprising’, a short-lived left-wing revolt that tried to establish a communist state in Germany in January 1919. Their shared utopian correspondence in the form of a chain letter circulated between them over a two-year period gave rise to many of the ideas and principles that were to underpin German Expressionism. It is regarded as being “probably the most significant exchange of theoretical ideas on architecture this [20th] century.” Certainly, their collective vision went on to directly influence well-known architects such as Eric Mendelsohn, and Mies Van Der Rohe. It also informed the work of established contemporaries like Hans Poelzig. 


Indeed, the interior of Poelzig’s Schauspielhaus, Berlin (1919), which is recognised as an exemplar of Expressionism, owed a good deal to Scheerbart and Taut’s ideas. It can certainly be seen as one of most complete early forms of ‘light architecture’. The theatre was a repurposed circus building designed for the impresario Max Reinhardt which was fitted out to include a highly decorative ceiling in the main auditorium made up of dropped ‘stalactite’ forms that were backlit to create a glowing effect. Small coloured electric ‘pea-lamps’ were integrated into the end of many of the stalactites to create a glittering constellation whilst the capitals of the fluted ‘fountain’ columns in the foyers provided both the functional and ambient lighting through concealed green, yellow, and pink lighting. As Wassili Luckhardt observed at the time:


“The interior of the large dome is hung with an infinite variety of pendants which are given a softly curving movement by the hollow of the cupola on to which they are fastened, so that especially when light is thrown against the tiny reflectors on each tip, the impression of a certain dissolution and infinity results."


The use of electric light by many of the German Expressionist architects often showed an adherence to its inclusion as part of the overall architectural composition such that it went well beyond function alone, becoming a means of consciously creating an identity for their buildings after dark.


And it is important to understand this aspect of light architecture – the night-time identity of a building. As Neumann explains:


Berlin was perhaps the most self-conscious of Europe’s capitals in the 1920’s, continuously concerned with its status, prestige and appearance…Photo reports from London, Paris, and New York had long established the nocturnal appearance of a city as a central criterion for metropolitan qualities…In September 1924, representatives of the German film and lighting industries had invited lawmakers and businessmen to a movie theatre on Postdamer Platz and showed them documentary films about New York City and London by night. This screening was part of an ongoing effort to ease restrictions and win support for more ‘Lichtreklame’ (luminous advertisements). All electric advertising has been switched of in 1916 in Berlin, and a hesitant reintroduction in 1921 had made little progress, particularly due to regulations restricting advertising to the first floor. While the initiative sprang from the immediate business interests of the lighting and film industry, it was generally welcomed as addressing a widespread concern."


The relationship between illuminated architecture and illuminated advertising, when overlayed with the utopian visions of Scheerbart, Taut and the Glass Chain, helps explain the lit form of many Expressionist buildings of the 1920’s and 30’s. The idea that the night-time face of buildings was just as important as their daytime image was beginning to gain traction, and it was quickly realised that outcomes could be much improved if the thinking around a building and its form, materials and details integrated both ideas and technology around lighting rather than treated them as an afterthought.


Perhaps the most obvious examples of this new approach are a series of commercial buildings designed by Eric Mendelsohn which interestingly were deliberately photographed from the same viewpoint both by day and night to illustrate the transition between their diurnal and nocturnal image. These included his 1926 Schocken Department Store in Stuttgart, the C. A. Herpic Department Store in Berlin, and the Petersdorff Department Store, Breslau, both completed in 1928. These streamlined buildings clearly and deliberately articulated their form and the identity of the occupier after dark through electric light. In the case of Schocken, the illuminated interior made the building into a glowing lantern, its internally lit signage becoming part of the external expression at night. With Herpic the façade itself was strongly expressed through linear lighting carefully detailed into the external cladding. Petersdorff was different again with concealed internal linear lighting to the edge of the building highlighting a translucent band of glass at the top of the ribbon windows which reflected light from white curtains set back into the space. All three buildings projected a stronger identity for their occupiers by night than they did by day.


Original members of the ‘Glass Chain’ such as Wassili and Hans Luckhardt also created examples of light architecture through the incorporation of illuminated advertising. The most prominent being their renovation of Tauentzienstrasse 3 in Berlin (1927) which was illuminated with concealed coloured linear lighting integrated with brass signage.


‘Light architecture’, however, was not limited to Germany alone with many good examples elsewhere in Europe:


In the Netherlands the famous De Volharding Building in The Hague by Jan Buijs and Joan Lürsen completed in 1928 became an extraordinary inverse of its daytime presence. Clad entirely in glass it became the transparent and translucent version of its much more solid appearance by day. Its glowing glass brick stair and elevator towers, and backlit opal glass cladding, incorporating advertising created the effect of the entire form becoming a glowing lantern at night. It was even topped with a ‘light tower’ that acted as a beacon that could be seen from a distance.


Meanwhile in Britain Joseph Emberton’s 1936 Simpson’s of Piccadilly, London incorporated concealed linear, red-green-blue colour-changing neon lighting into its façade. Controlled by a series of dimmers a wide range of colours of light could be produced including white. The façade panels were also slightly canted to ensure the lighting looked as even as possible. The influence of Eric Mendelsohn’s work is not surprising when it is understood that his previous assistant, the structural engineer Felix Samuely, worked in close collaboration with both Emberton and the Bauhaus artist and designer Làszló Moholy-Nagy to realise the project.


Whilst the idea of integrating illuminated signage and advertising into facades was an important form, the manner in which some architects began to do that effectively created what might be regarded as early examples of ‘media facades’.


Perhaps most notable of these, again in the Netherlands, was the Bioscoop Vreeburg, a small cinema in Utrecht. The famous architect and furniture designer Gerrit Rietveld renovated it twice. The second iteration in 1936 saw the façade being constructed as a series of coloured light boxes that spelt out the name of the building echoing the integration of the principles of both Lichtarchitektur and Lichtreklame. Whilst unfortunately the cinema closed in 1974 the light boxes have been refurbished and remain to this day.

Conclusion

“The first wave of enthusiasm, rich debate, and a multitude of projects ended with the black-outs of World War II and subsequent changes in stylistic taste. A fresh approach to integrating nocturnal illumination into modern architecture followed in the 1950’s and 60’s until the energy crisis of 1973 terminated all such projects".


Whilst there were many buildings designed and constructed in Europe in the first part of the 20th century that explored the possibilities that the thoughtful and creative integration of lighting into built form, the term ‘light architecture’ seemed to disappear from use until relatively recently. Part of the reason for this was undoubtedly the change to the economy, and the programme of building in Europe, and particularly Germany, brought about by a combination of the Great Depression and the advent of World War II.


And whilst the US experience of illuminating buildings carried on during the late 1930’s and even during the 1940’s, particularly through ‘Art Deco’, it perhaps wasn’t until the wave of German emigres such as Mies Van Der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Làszló Moholy-Nagy and other former members of the Bauhaus arrived in America and started developing a new wave of architecture in the 1950’s that we began to see the next evolution of light architecture take place. Not that the term was entirely forgotten: An important and compelling visual essay about light and architecture by Wassili Luckhardt, the former member of the ‘Glass Chain’ was included in a book by Walter Köhler called ‘Lichtarchitektur’ published in Germany in 1956. It was re-published in the English language in the US in 1959 as ‘Lighting in Architecture’. We can but speculate that had the original title been translated more literally, rather than adjusted for its American audience, whether the term ‘light architecture’ may be part of more common parlance amongst architects and designers today.


The next article in this series looks at the development of ‘architecture of the night’ and how it differs from the European experience.



The third and final part then looks at the way in which both traditions have led to the way in which ‘light architecture’ slowly re-emerges in the second half of the 20th century to show its true potential in response to the digital revolution today.


Note

Whilst this article has drawn on a wide series of sources the author wishes to acknowledge the work of Dietrich Neumann, and in particular his seminal publication ‘Architecture pf the Night’ (The Illuminated Building, Prestel, New York 2002) which has not only provided a guide but also been a source of inspiration. Many of the topics summarised above are covered in more detail in that publication and is therefore recommended reading for further information on the topic.