Home of Walter Gropius
1938


68 Baker Bridge Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts, USA

Walter Gropius was one of the principal modernist architects. His move to the United States in the 1930s was an event of historic significance. Thereafter, the United States, not Europe, would lead the way in innovative architecture. In the US, Gropius taught at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. He used his home as instructional material. It became a symbol of the new international style that had come to America from the old world and that drew fire from many quarters—ranging from Frank Lloyd Wright to Gropius’ angry neighbors.
Home of Philip Johnson
1949





© Eirik Johnson, Courtesy of the Glass House
Glass House at night © Stacy Bass, Courtesy of the Glass House
© Eirik Johnson, Courtesy of the Glass House
199 Elm St, New Canaan, Connecticut, USA

© Bill Pierce / Getty Images
In 1932, Philip Johnson organized “The International Style: Architecture since 1922,” a show in New York that introduced the United States to modernist European architecture. Johnson later helped find positions in the US for the architects featured in the show. After receiving a degree in architecture, Johnson began his professional life by building his own home. The small house is the embodiment of modernism. The residential capsule is limited to a bare minimum of space, with a minimum of furnishings, no exterior walls (the walls are windows) and no interior partitions (the entire interior is a single room) and blends into the air and green of the surrounding woods. This is an almost immaterial home-idea.
© Eirik Johnson, Courtesy of the Glass House





















