The design geniuses who fled turmoil

The design geniuses who fled turmoil Getty Images How a group of émigrés overcame adversity – and enriched the world with their modernist vision. There was a book that taught Jewish people British etiquette.” The Isokon building was also known as Lawn Road Flats and was a bold experiment in minimalist urban living Many émigrés to the UK had been talented, experimental teachers or alumni of the highly influential Bauhaus school of art and design, founded by Gropius in 1919. Spreading the word “Thanks to the thorough grounding Bauhaus students received, they were more adaptable as émigrés,” says Alan Powers, author of new book Bauhaus Goes West: Modern Art and Design in Britain and America. He was also offered free accommodation by Jack Pritchard at Lawn Road Flats and the promise of work through Pritchard’s development firm, Isokon.” Isokon Archive The modernist furniture created by Bauhaus members changed design history forever Hampstead in north London was, like nearby Swiss Cottage and St John’s Wood, a centre for left-wing thinking, and in the 1930s several thousand German-speaking refugees, also known as the Hitler émigrés, lived there, including Sigmund Freud. Britain at the time wasn’t receptive to modernist architecture, she adds: “Anthony Blunt rightly gave the reason for the English dislike of modernist buildings as being ‘because they’re not homey’.” In 1936, Gropius accepted an offer to become chair of the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, which had shown a great interest in the Bauhaus while it was still active.