The city of
Vienna is the legal owner of the building, after the city's mayor Leopold
Gratz offered Hundertwasser a plot of land in the city in 1977 "on which
to build a house in line with your ideas and wishes (with trees and grass
on the roof)."
After the
mayor contracted a professional architect to help create the model for
the house, Hundertwasser was apparently so appalled by the cold geometry
of the architect's design that he went out and purchased 50 match boxes
and stacked them into a design more to his liking, including the two towers
and stepping-stone terrace design.
After parting
ways with the first architect, the eccentric Hundertwasser finally
found his architectural ally in a most unexpected place: the city's coldly-named
Administration Department 19. The man's name was Peter Pelikan,.
Pelikan joined
the project in late 1981 and quickly helped Hundertwasser turn his original
vision into reality instead of trying to impose one on the artist.
The completed
project eventually mirrored Hundertwasser's "fairy tale castle"
match box design more than the original architect's stark and geometric
rendering, much to the delight of its many residents as well as tourists
and architectural buffs today.
Construction
of the apartment complex began August 13, 1983 and was completed Oct. 15,
1986 at a cost of 7,122,000 euros (1986 value).
According to
the book The Hundertwasser House, sponsored by the Austrian government:
"From the
summer of 1984 onwards, Hundertwasser worked almost constantly on the construction
of the house. Every day, he worked with the construction workers from morning
to night. In the work breaks, they drank coffee at Grete Faast's, the pub
on the corner. It is a miracle that Hundertwasser was not run over by a
car or tram on the narrow Lowengasse when he ran across the street countless
times to look at work in the upper stories. There were often collisions
when drivers became distracted by the house. In the last months, work was
impeded by the many curious onlookers walking around the construction site,
along the corridors and stairways. Doors had to be locked, and night watchmen
and barriers kept people away out of hours. The growing number of guided
tours had to be cancelled to avoid impeding the work."
An opening
day celebration of the official opening of the house had to be stretched
out over two days in Sept. 1985 to accommodate the 70,000 people who wished
to view it.
The first tenants
moved in March 1, 1986, and many of them still call the place home.
The 52 units
which make up the bulk of the building cover 3,556 square meters of space,
giving its 200 residents plenty of room to enjoy their surroundings. The
building weighs approximately 12,400 metric tons, 1,000 of which are made
up by plants and soil.
The house is
built entirely by 2,800 metric tons of brick, with no interior skeleton
of concrete, which further reinforces the organic nature of the project.
Hundertwasserhaus
also includes a "wintergarten" and two "kids rooms" for use
by all tenants, and also includes a café and a doctor's practice
within its walls. Across the street, visitors to Hundertwasserhaus can
browse through the gift shop and purchase t-shirts, books and postcards
bearing the unique building's image.
19 roof terraces
(16 common and three private) cover approximately 1,000 square meters
of space and many of the 250 plants and trees that grow within the structure
are visible to passersby.
Key elements
of Hundertwasser's masterpiece include:
-
Greenery on the
roof. Hundertwasser wanted the roof spaces to be as natural as possible,
so he had grass, bushes and trees planted on the roof to fulfill that vision.
-
Windows of all
different shapes and sizes. The different window shapes can be considered
as a "family of old, young, stout and slender," which the artist
hoped would convey a sense of "dancing" to the viewers.
-
Cap stones are
placed over almost every window, giving each window its own accent piece.
-
Columns. These
reminded Hundertwasser of trees, and can be seen on every side of the building.
They serve not only as support structures but also as decorative pieces
of art.
-
Uneven floors
and walls. Curved surfaces were laid intentionally to remind the occupants
of walking on a forest floor, with its own natural curves and variations
in smoothness and height.
-
There is an almost
non-sensical layout scheme to the apartments, which is fittingly exactly
opposite of the grid system which the man abhorred. Apartments are seemingly
stacked on top of each other like a village of homes built on a hillside.
-
Onion towers.
Hundertwasser's personal calling card and the "crowning glory" of
the building.
Interior and
exterior tiles are not laid in a rank and file design, but much like the
layout of the windows, are placed at incongruous and playful angles.
According the
book Hundertwasser, written by Wieland Schmied, the designer's goal
was a complex of simplicity, an idea as contradictory as the man himself.
"Using often
amazingly simple means, Hundertwasser endeavored to incorporate romantic
elements into his house and suggest an unbroken link with nature and the
life forms of past epochs."
Writers Hametner
and Metzer sum the building's bells and whistles this way: "No column
is like any other, their bulges and rings are irregular … everywhere on
the façade further unusual details can be discovered: spheres to
enhance corners of the brickwork, various figures made of molded marble,
cones on Kegelgasse and lions looking down on Lowengasse. Ventilation ducts
and chimneys in the Venetian style were turned into decorative elements,
and the steep stairwell on Lowengasse is decorated with specially manufactured
mirror tiles which reflect the sun, moon and stars."
While viewing
the structure, one might think that the labor involved in such a construction
would have been tedious and difficult for the men and women involved in
the task.
But according
to Schmied, the artist said of the complex construction process:
"The wonderful
thing was that during the construction work the motivation of the construction
workers was completely different than is the case with a normal building,
where everything is standardized and prefabricated and sterile; then you
work … without much enthusiasm. Here they had enjoyed working and it is
a fact that this complicated building, with such different battlements
and points ¬– it's a castle in which every window is different – was
completed in just one year. And that is how I see the construction method
of the future. People who help with the building, the construction workers
and bricklayers as well as the municipal authorities, will enjoy doing
it. At the same time, I would like to say here that this should not be
protected as an historic monument. For when people live in a house under
such protection, it acts as a constraint. It should be possible for every
person living there to change the facades I have installed at any time
in line with his or her own wishes…"
As I prepare
to leave for home, completely impressed with Hundertwasser's completed
vision, I spy a mosaic face looking at me from one of the walls near the
café. I take a picture of it and think to myself that only a man
as unique as Hundertwasser would think to add a human face on such a natural
and odd expression of architecture. But it is a public housing apartment,
after all.
I have seen
great architecture on three continents, toured Frank Lloyd Wright's
Fallingwater and Kentuck Knob in the wilds of Pennsylvania, but I have
never walked away from a structure with so much respect for its creator
as I took with me on that visit to the corner of Lowengasse and Kegelgasse
in Vienna's Third District.
In Sept. 2005,
Hundertwasserhaus celebrated its 20th anniversary of providing a unique
living space for the people of Vienna.
It continues
to stand out as a vibrant architectural monument of the 20th century, honoring
both the natural world and the architectural rebel who once proclaimed:
"You are a guest of nature: Behave."
Michael Felton-O'Brien
is a freelance writer and photographer who currently lives in Vienna, Austria. |
