Three Architects from the Master Class of Otto Wagner: Emil Hoppe, Marcel Kammerer, Otto Schonthal

Adolf Loos, Josef Hoffmann, and Otto Wagner have been widely acclaimed in recent celebrations of turn of the century Viennese art, architecture, and furniture design. But until now little has been known about the other architects who gave meaning to the term "Viennese style." This collection of drawings and sketches by Otto Wagner's three most gifted students provides a fascinating new source of documentary material on the early modern period. Published for the first time, the drawings include projects and executed designs ranging from apartment houses to villas, furniture, textiles and glassware, and achieve a graphic quality that has rarely been equaled. Emile Hoppe, Marcel Kammerer, and Otto Schonthal were the outstanding students in Otto Wagner's special class at the Akademie in Vienna - the famous Wagnerschule - and upon graduation were invited to join his studio, where they collaborated on some of his most important projects before establishing their own firm in 1909. The works presented here mark a climax in Viennese architectural design in which a highly developed consciousness is combined with the structural and material innovations characteristic of the Wagnerschule. The drawings are noteworthy not only for their intrinsic qualities, but also as a rich source of inspiration and a refreshing vocabulary for contemporary architects and designers. An extended essay by Iain Boyd Whyte on the three architects' development and practice accompany this exciting catalog of drawings. Whyte is a Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh and has written extensively on 20th-century German architecture, including the book The Crystal Chain Letters: Architectural Fantasies by Bruno Taut and His Circle.