The skin and bones of structure. A brief history of how Mies van der Rohe revealed the skeleton of the house

Alejandro Cervilla García

doi:10.5277/arc190202

Abstract

Mies van der Rohe is considered one of the great masters of the 20th century, both for the coherence of his work and for his ability to make modern architecture based on the importance of structure. This is recognized by the architect and architectural critic, Peter Blake, in the chapter he devoted to Mies van der Rohe, entitled The Mastery of Structure, in his “Masters of Architecture” series. In the present article we would like to analyze the evolution of the image of structure in the houses of Mies van der Rohe, from his very first dwelling, Riehl House, built in Berlin in 1907, to his last house, Morris Greenwald, built in Weston in 1953. We will see how structure underwent a radical transformation over this period progressing from the innermost hidden realm of Architecture outwards to its exterior, and how in this process, the German maestro managed to transcend the idea of structure and its load-bearing capability to convert it into the main artistic element of his architecture.

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2019

2(58)

DOI: 10.5277/arc190202

Alejandro Cervilla García*

The skin and bones of structure.

A brief history of how Mies van der Rohe

revealed the skeleton of the house

Szkielet i obudowa.

Krótka historia tego, jak Mies van der Rohe

wyeksponował konstrukcję budynku

In 1907, Mies van der Rohe built his first work, Riehl

House, in Potsdam, a classic house with a rectangular

floor plan, a structure of brick load-bearing walls with

a plaster of slaked lime and a sloping roof (Fig. 1).

Although, the construction of reinforced concrete build-

ings had already begun in Europe in 1890 [2], [3,

pp. 54–62], and the first steel-structured skyscrapers in

America had made their appearance in 1880 [4, pp. 365–

446], the use of concrete and steel had not yet become

widespread, so Mies used traditional construction meth-

ods in this first work.

On the outside of the house we observe the trace of

a structure that wants to reveal itself. On the longitudinal

facade the bas-relief drawing of some pilasters, located at

the end of the transverse load-bearing walls, stands out.

And on the side facade, which overlooks Lake Griebnitz,

the abutments and the architrave of the porch are shown

in semi-shade. The first device reminds us of the presenta-

tion of the facade wall used by the architects of classical

Rome and the Renaissance

: an ornamental structure in

* ORCID: 0000-0001-6103-1976. Polytechnic University of Mad-

rid, Spain.

The architects of classical Rome used to employ classical Greek

arrangements in their public buildings, not with a structural, but rather

an ornamental function. In this way, the Greek arrangements of columns

and semi columns, pilasters and semi pilasters, architraves, pediments

and cornices, were applied to the wall surfaces, both facade and interior,

establishing a regular rhythm of decoration on the wall surface. This

constructive and decorative tradition was recovered in the Renaissance

bas-relief, defining a wall. The second device reminds us

of the classic Greek tool of the peristyle in the semi-open

spaces that surrounded temples

. But in essence, this first

home by Mies is a clear example of a house with a hidden

structure. There is no clue to its structural reality. You

cannot see the brickwork, the formation of the lintels, or

the thickness of the walls. Neither can you see the base of

the walls nor the wooden frame that constitutes the roof.

This compact, symmetrical and compartmentalized

house scheme, with a brick load-bearing wall structure

and sloping roof served as a model for a whole series of

sub sequent houses: Perls house (Zehlendorf, Berlin, 1911),

Werner house (Berlin, 1913), Warnholtz house (Heer -

strasse, Berlin, 1913), Urbig house (Potsdam, 1917),

Feld mann house (Berlin, 1922) and Eichstaedt house

(Berlin, 1922). All these have a structure of brick load-

bearing walls hidden underneath the cladding, the only

external reference being the decoration in bas-relief, or

the walk-way porticoes and open veranda. Only in the

Mosler House, built in Potsdam in 1924, do we see a load-

and on the facades of Brunelleschi, Bramante or Palladio, among others;

it is very common to see a decoration on the wall, in low or high relief,

composed of pilasters, columns, architraves, or other Greek elements.

Neoclassicism is also heir to this tradition. In Germany, Schinkel is

a clear example. In the Riehl house, Mies only continues this way of

building and decorating [5, pp. 25–49].

The peristyle surrounding the nave is the main element of the

classical Greek temple; thus, the peristyle was built even before the

interior nave [6, p. 224].

16 Alejandro Cervilla García

bearing wall solution with uncoated, exposed brick, and

with stone or rowlock brickwork lintels emphasizing the

constructive uniqueness of the openings in the wall (Fig. 2).

This idea of exposed brickwork, which Mies tried for the

first time in the unbuilt project of the Kempner house

(Ber lin, 1919), derives from his admiration for the clarity

and constructive honesty of the Dutch master H.P. Ber lage

And this is his first step towards discovering structure.

The unmasking of steel

As Mies builds his classic, compact, symmetrical

houses with a brick load-bearing wall structure and slop-

ing roof, he studies new projects in which compactness

and symmetry are partially dissolved and in which the flat

roof replaces the sloping roof. This compositional change

did not initially imply any alteration to the structure, but

over time the brick load-bearing wall gave way to a mixed

structure of brick and steel, or reinforced concrete.

In 1927 he built his first modern house, the Wolf

House, in Guben. Situated at the top of a narrow, elon-

gated plot of land cascading down via a series of terraces

towards the river Neisse, the house consists of a staggered

set of volumes of exposed brick with an asymmetrical

triple L layout on the ground floor, and a large continuous

living area that runs through the dwelling from east to

west. The living room is the first large continuous space

that Mies builds and extends to the outside with two large

The Amsterdam Stock Exchange, built in 1903, is a fine example

of this constructive clarity and honesty advocated by Berlage. In this

building the Dutch master comes up with a visible and explicit architec-

tural construction, in which the structure and, especially, the structural

elements of transition are accentuated. The brickwork of the walls is

exposed, and both the lintels and the arch stones, abutments and skew-

backs of the arches, or the corbels on which the beams are unloaded, are

built with grey granite, almost sculptural pieces that contrast with the

continuity of the red brickwork. Mies had the opportunity of acquainting

himself with Berlage’s work during his stay in Holland while collaborat-

ing on a work by Peter Behrens, and he even competed against him

in the competition for the Kröller Müller family home [8, pp. 32, 60], [9,

pp. 71–73].

cantilevered slabs, one towards the courtyard leading to

the dwelling and the other to the main terrace.

To better understand the significance of the Wolf

House, let’s compare it to the Mosler House, built three

years earlier. The structure of the Wolf House, with the

exception of its two cantilevered slabs, is not in essence

very different from the structure of the Mosler House,

a strong brick box. But the shape and space of these two

houses are very different: contrasting with the compact

prismatic and symmetrical volume of the Mosler House is

the set of scattered volumes and the asymmetrical compo-

sition of the Wolf House. Compared with the compart-

mentalized spaces of the Mosler House are the three inter-

connected spaces of the Wolf House, which are three

intersecting rectangles. The structure in both cases is

similar: a brick load-bearing wall assisted by the steel

substructure of the lintels. Even the brickwork is the same

in both cases, a Gothic arrangement with alternating

stretchers and headers in all the courses. The structural

expression, however, is very different in the two houses.

The lintels are displayed in the Mosler House, while in

Wolf House the substructure underlying the formation of

the openings remains hidden. And the brickwork with its

horizontal course passes over the windows as if by magic.

On the other hand, there is the cantilevered slab on the

main Wolf House terrace. This slab needs an edge beam

to support the cantilever. And the beam is evident when

viewed from the terrace, but not when viewed from the

river (Fig. 3). On the main facade of the house the edge

beam disappears, because it is set back from this facade,

and because it also remains hidden in the shade. It seems

obvious that Mies did not want to show the edge of the

beam on this facade, but the abstract presence of a white

slab that simply rests on the brick wall.

Another important difference between Wolf House and

Mosler House is the external placement of the windows,

which means that the considerable thickness of the brick

Fig. 1. Riehl House, Potsdam, Berlin, 1907 (Müller-Rentsch) [1, p. 22]

Il. 1. Riehl House, Poczdam, Berlin, 1907 (Müller-Rentsch) [1, s. 22]

Fig. 2. Mosler House, Potsdam, Berlin, 1926

(Hans-Christian Schink) [7, p. 65]

Il. 2. Mosler House, Poczdam, Berlin, 1926

(Hans-Christian Schink) [7, s. 65]

The skin and bones of structure /Szkielet i obudowa 17

walls – 65 cm in the basement and 50 cm the remaining

floors – is not visible from the outside. Not only does the

steel remain hidden in this house, but also the brick mass

becomes apparently lighter, as if it were a continuous skin

rather than a load-bearing wall. Somehow there is a con-

cealment of the structure; a treatment of the brickwork

more plastic than expressive [11, pp. 162–165].

One begins to gradually discern a different treatment

of structure in the works built by Mies. In the Weissen-

hofseidlung apartment block in Stuttgart, also built be-

tween 1925 and 1927, the structure is partially seen on the

facade, as brush-strokes of thin supports alternating be-

tween the large horizontal openings (Fig. 4). This is the

first steel grid structure built by Mies, and on the facade

the columns are absorbed into the brickwork and plaster

of cement and white paint. But it was not until he built the

houses in Krefeld, between 1927 and 1930, that Mies left

a steel column on the facade completely visible for the

first time. The quasi-twin Esters and Lange houses con-

tinue the compositional systems of the Wolf House: asy-

mmetric floors, interconnection and continuity of space,

large openings

and cantilevered elements. And the struc-

tural arrangement is also continued; a mixed system con-

sisting of brick load-bearing walls and steel substructure.

The treatment of the brick is similar to that of the Wolf

house, as if it were a brick skin, rather than a massive

load-bearing wall. Here, too, the windows are placed on

the external side of the facade walls, concealing their

enormous thickness. And the brick also passes almost im-

perceptibly over the hollows, without forming the lintel.

In Esters House Mies would have preferred even larger openings.

This is confirmed by a watercolour that is preserved today in the MoMA

and in an interview he gave in 1966: I wanted more glass in the house

but the client didn’t like the idea [7, p. 98].

Fig. 3. Wolf House, Guben, 1925–1927: a) view from the river, b) view from the terrace [10, pp. 38, 39]

Il. 3. Wolf House, Gubin, 1925–1927: a) widok od strony rzeki, b) widok od strony tarasu [10, s. 38, 39]

But, as we said, this is the first time that Mies has em-

ployed a free-standing steel pillar (Fig. 5). The large over-

hanging slabs of the porches, which in both houses serve

as access to the garden, are supported by a square pillar,

slightly recessed from the edge of the white roof deck and

painted black, so that by contrast, the white deck seems to

float. The steel profile tries to remain in the background,

but there it is, for all to see. Surely for Mies, this column

was unimportant. We note that he did not place it at the

corner of the slab, but set back from it. And it has no base,

no capital, no starting point, and no visible beam resting

on it. And above all, we take note of its dark color. For

Mies, the continuous white plane of the Weissenhofsied-

lung housing block was very recent, with those portions

of column vibrating on the facade in contrast to the shad-

ed windows. In this case, the only white plane he wants to

highlight is that of the porch roof, and nothing else. This

free-standing column of the Krefeld houses is a necessary

column, but is it a desired column?

There are more places in these Krefeld houses where

steel is necessarily exposed. We find it in the mullions of

the large openings, although these are also painted in

a dark color and camouflaged within the carpentry of the

windows. And it is partially visible where it forms the

lintels of the windows. In these houses it would seem that

the steel is expressing an urge to venture outside, to be

present, and to tell us that the age of the brick is coming

to an end. Slowly, Mies is assuming the language of mod-

ern structure.

The structural grid appears

Villa Tugendhat, built in Brno between 1928 and 1930,

is the first single-family home in which Mies uses the

steel grid structure. In just a few months, the German

18 Alejandro Cervilla García

architect replaces his brick wall structure, in which the

steel substructure is hidden for the most part, with a grid

of exposed steel columns (Fig. 6). In September 1928

Mies travelled to Brno to inspect the site, a plot of about

two thousand square meters situated on a hillside over-

looking the city center. Between 1928 and early 1929 he

designed the project, and between June 1929 and

December 1930 he built it

Villa Tugendhat has three floors. The first floor, with

the main entrance, has three areas, one for the master bed-

room, another for the children’s bedrooms, and a third for

staff accommodation and the garage. Between these three

volumes there is a large terrace. And between the parents’

area and the children’s area is the entrance hall with

a semi-cylindrical staircase that communicates with the

ground floor. Descending the two flights of stairs we

reach the large living area which, despite its open-plan

layout has separate areas for the study, the library, the din-

ing room and the piano. Carpets, curtains, an onyx wall

and a semi-cylindrical ebony wood screen create these

divisions. However, above all, the outstanding feature in

this room is the large glazed facade on two sides, with the

long 23-meter side facing southwest, and the short 15-me-

ter side facing southeast, enclosing a greenhouse. The en-

tire window is retractable, hidden underground on the

lower floor, so that during the summer the living room

becomes a large porch with exceptional views of the city

of Brno. On the north side of the living room is a terrace

leading to the garden, and to the east are the kitchen areas

The Villa Tugendhat project was developed almost in parallel

with that of the Barcelona Pavilion. Hence the similarities between the

two works. At the beginning of July 1928, the German government com-

missioned Mies to design the Barcelona Pavilion. In October of the

same year the design was defined, and between October and February

the plans were drawn up. Work began in February and the pavilion was

inaugurated on 26 May 1929 [12, pp. 7, 8], [13].

and service rooms. Finally, on the semi-basement floor,

are the storerooms and the various facilities and service

areas: air conditioning, heating, photo processing room,

laundry, and the mechanism for lowering the living room

window. In line with Mies’s modern compositions, the

floor plan of Villa Tugendhat is asymmetrical, dynamic

and continuous, despite being a grid structure of rectangu-

lar columns

In an interview Greta Tugendhat recalls her impressions

on viewing the house for the first time: At first we saw the

floors of a large room in which there were two free-stand-

ing walls, one semi-circular and the other straight. We

ticed that there were small crosses about five meters

apart and asked, What is this? Mies answered calmly. They

are the steel supports that are holding up the structure. At

that time there was no house with that type of structure,

so you can imagine our initial surprise [15, p. 15].

This structure, which Mies tried out both in Villa

Tugendhat and in the Barcelona Pavilion, became a basic

tool for his homes in the 1930s. It is a table-type struc-

ture

. On the one hand, the ceiling, the horizontal slab,

and on the other hand the columns serving as support.

A table with recessed columns. The structure is formed by

steel porticos on cruciform columns

. It is a laminated

steel unidirectional structure, made up of seven modules

in an east-west direction and three modules in a north-

south direction. The gallery is rectangular, 4.90 × 5.50 m,

As Christian Norberg Schulz explains, one of the consequences

of this open plan is that the load-bearing function becomes independent

from the function of compartmentalizing spaces. The columns punctuate

the space and the walls of stone, wood, or curtains delineate the spaces

[14, pp. 45–70].

The term is from Alberto Campo Baeza [16].

Although today we associate the cruciform steel column with

Mies van der Rohe, and especially with his projects for Villa Tugendhat

and the Barcelona Pavilion, the fact is that Bruno Taut had already used

this type of column in the Versuchspavilion in Berlin in 1928. Expo si-

ción Bruno Taut, Maestro de la Construcción cromática (Madrid: Fun-

da ción COAM, 2011).

Fig. 5. Esters House, Krefeld, 1927–1930.

View from the garden

(photo by A. Cervilla García, August 2011)

Il. 5. Esters House, Krefeld, 1927–1930.

Widok od strony ogrodu

(fot. A. Cervilla García, sierpień 2011)

Fig. 4. Facade of the Weissenhofsiedlung Apartment Block,

Stuttgart, 1925–1927 (photo by A. Cervilla García, August 2011)

Il. 4. Fasada Weissenhofsiedlung Apartment Block,

Stuttgart, 1925–1927 (fot. A. Cervilla García, sierpień 2011)

The skin and bones of structure /Szkielet i obudowa 19

and not a perfect square, as one might think, given the

cruciform geometry of the pillar. The 5.50 m beams are

arranged perpendicular to the large glazed front of the

living room and the slabs are parallel.

Probably, if Mies had wished to reflect the arrange-

ment of the ceiling beams on the shape of the column,

then he would not have made a cruciform column. This

column, with its arms of equal dimensions, also has the

same inertia in both directions, that of the beams and that

of the slabs. And yet it is the beams that transmit the great-

est loads and moments to them. A more rigorous option

would have been a column with greater inertia in the direc-

tion of the beams. In fact, if we analyze the inertia of the

cruciform column, we can confirm that the design criteria

of this column go beyond the strictly mechanical (Fig. 6).

The column is made up of four L-profiles of 90 mm side

and 10 mm thickness, with an inertia of 1,266.48 cm

. But

if Mies had arranged a square group instead of the cruci-

form arrangement, he would have obtained a column with

an inertia of 4,024.36 cm

. That is to say, with the same

elements, he could have obtained a column with four

times greater inertia. A much stronger column, simply

Fig. 6. Structure of Villa Tugendhat, Brno, 1928–1930 (drawing by A. Cervilla García)

Il. 6. Konstrukcja Villi Tugendhat, Brno, 1928–1930 (rys. A. Cervilla García)

Fig. 7. The three types of columns in Villa Tugendhat (photo by A. Cervilla García, December 2009)

Il. 7. Trzy rodzaje słupów w Villi Tugendhat (fot. A. Cervilla García, grudzień 2009)

20 Alejandro Cervilla García

with a change of shape. But it seems that Mies is not look-

ing for strict compliance with structural logic in these col-

umns. He is not looking for an efficient column. There is

something else, which we discovered with our analysis of

the three types of columns in Villa Tugendhat.

Mies treats each column differently depending on its

location. On the outside terraces, the columns are clad

in a black galvanized steel jacket. In the kitchen and ser-

vice area they are uncoated, and the steel is painted white.

In the large living area, the columns are covered with

a chrome-plated, shiny, reflective steel casing (Fig. 7).

The black columns wish to disappear, to remain in the

background in shadow. They are holding up a white ceil-

ing and rise up from a white floor, in other words, they are

columns in discontinuity with ceiling and floor. And they

are inflated columns. The sleeve that covers them hides

the authentic supporting elements. The white columns are

used in the service spaces, the areas of least interest in the

house. These columns do not have a rounded sleeve; their

edges are sharper. They are tenser, more expressive of

their function and their materiality. As the ceiling they

support is white and the floor is also white, there is conti-

nuity here, at least in color, between ceiling, support and

floor. These columns do not want to disappear. They do

not hide the frame that shapes them. Finally, the columns

with a chrome-plated steel casing are the most important.

The cruciform section has a function similar to that of the

grooves of the columns of classical Greece

. This inward

Viollet le Duc associates the origin of the grooves of the Greek

column with a lighting effect: To the Greek architect, the columns seem

too flat when exposed to light, and too bland and indecisive in the shade.

He cuts out straight grooves along the entire height of the shaft, and then

hollows out these grooves and thus forms grooves deep enough to con-

centrate the oblique light on the edges, but not enough for these edges

to become an obstacle and injure the people passing between the col-

umns. The light of the sun, when it repeats a sequence of longitudinal

lights and shadows on each shaft, gives them back the importance that

they had lost when they were only conical [17, pp. 47, 48].

and outward interplay brings about a certain dematerial-

ization of the column. In addition, the fact that the edges

of the cross are rounded, and that the casing material

shines and reflects – not a perfect reflection like that of

a burnished mirror, but a deformed reflection – further

intensifies the dematerializing effect of the shape. Mies

wants these columns to be tangible elements that partici-

pate in the play of reflections of the house, together with

the steel tubes of the armchairs and chairs, the glass panes

or the golden onyx. He wants to treat them with ostenta-

tion. In fact, the dematerializing effect used by the mae-

stro does not lead to the concealment of the columns.

When we are inside this room, we cannot ignore the mag-

ical presence of these shining columns. It is true that their

formal appearance is confusing, but there they are, mag-

netic, unreal and luminous. They are part of the game of

space. Only the intersection with the ceiling and the floor

tells of their true cross-section. The same words used by

Fritz Neumeyer when referring to the Barcelona Pavilion

could be used here: The (Villa Tugendhat) was a display

structure that pointed to architecture itself as an artwork

of space. Approaching and entering the (Villa Tugendhat)

encourages spectator participation, physically, psycho-

logically, and cognitively [18, p. 105].

In the symmetrical dialogue between the white plaster

ceiling and the white linoleum floor, the chromed steel

pillars are a break in continuity. It seems that the slab does

not rest on the cruciform pillars, but is suspended above

them. White pillars would have emphasized the idea of

supporting a slab that is also white, and its transition to

the white floor. And in fact, when we look at the house

from the outside, this is when we can best appreciate the

effect of the roof floating on the columns (Fig. 8). The

roof of the living room merges with the terrace and forms

a powerful white lintel that flies 2.05 m upwards from the

columns. Although from the outside we can see the bright-

ness of these columns, their contact with the ceiling re-

mains in shadow, it disappears. There is an intentional

omission of the load transmission. On the one hand, Mies

proposes his first visible grid structure, and uses it both to

define space and as a decorative element. On the other

hand, he tries to hide the tectonics of the structure and its

load-bearing function. And he wants us to believe that the

white roof plate of the living room is suspended in the air,

like the slabs over the porches of the houses in Krefeld.

Here we have a clear case of structural poetics. Present

and at the same time absent structure. A real, but illusory

structure. And Mies wants so much to omit the idea of

support and structure that he even denies the perception of

the structural grid (Fig. 6). The history of Architecture

provides us with examples of hypostyle rooms in which

the perception of a gallery is very clear, such as the hypo-

style room of the temple of Amun in Karnak or the

mosque of Cordoba. In both cases the columns are visible,

as are the beams and slabs. The basic cell of the structural

grid, made up of four facing columns, two porticoes or

beams, and the slab between the two beams is visible in

these cases. In Villa Tugendhat, however, the beams are

hidden by the false plaster ceiling, and obviously also by

the slabs. Moreover, the partitions are arranged in such

Fig. 8. View of Villa Tugendhat from the garden

(photo by A. Cervilla García, December 2009)

Il. 8. Widok na Villę Tugendhat od strony ogrodu

(fot. A. Cervilla García, grudzień 2009)

The skin and bones of structure /Szkielet i obudowa 21

a way that no four columns of the same gallery are free-

standing. Here we do not have the sensation of a hypo-

style room. The onyx screen and the wooden cylindrical

screen prevent this from happening.

The column steps forward

In 1938, impelled by the political situation in Germany,

Mies moves to Chicago to head up the School of Ar-

chitecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology, IIT. And

coinciding with his arrival in America, the column takes

a step forward. In the IIT Minerals and Metals Research

Building, his first construction in America, built between

1942 and 1943, the steel columns and beams that make up

the structural porticoes are visible, complemented by

a brick enclosure. And just three years later, Mies designs

several buildings in which the columns are placed to the

front of the facade enclosure and the slabs. This will be

the case, for example, in the design of the Cantor Drive-in

Restaurant, 1945–1946, the Cantor House, 1946–1947,

and in the Promontory Apartments, built between 1946

and 1949 in Chicago, on the edge of Lake Michigan

(Fig. 9). Here we again see a feature of structural rational-

ism in Mies, which we had not seen in either the Krefeld

houses or in Villa Tugendhat. The columns are visible

along the entire facade, like the edges of the floor slabs,

and their section is staggered, becoming lighter as they

ascend upwards, and more robust as they reach the earth.

The shape of these columns does respond to the logic of

Gravity. They are nothing more than the corollary of the

increase in loads that the columns bear as they approach

the base of the tower.

In the Caine house, designed in 1950, Mies again plac-

es the columns to the front of the slab. But it was in the

Farnsworth house, designed and built between 1946 and

1951, that this solution attained its maximum expression.

The Farnsworth house is conceived as a single, diapha-

nous space, without columns, between two horizontal

planes. After many years of designing dwellings with free

and asymmetrical compositions, Mies returns to the box;

it is, however, no longer a classic box, but a modern box

of steel and glass, visually in continuity with the land-

scape. A diaphanous space and an emphatic volume with

the columns on the outside and clearly defined by the

glass. A house supported by eight columns situated to the

front of the slabs

The interior of the house is organized around a nucleus

of kitchen, bathroom and slightly off-center facilities,

leaving the kitchen area narrower and the living area

wider. Farnsworth is the house with floor-to-ceiling glass

that Mies had been pursuing for so long, and this time

the surroundings and the client allow him to radically

implement his idea. The feeling of transparency in the

Tegethoff links these external columns to the wooden supports

of the porch of the Chamberlain Cottage, 1939, designed by Walter Gro-

pius and Marcel Breuer, which are also placed to the front of the floor

slab [19, p. 131]. Returning to Farnsworth, there are previous draw ings

by Mies in which the columns are recessed, although in the ﬁnal version

the columns step forward and are placed to the front of the slab.

house is almost total. The relationship with the landscape

is absolute.

Basically, the Farnsworth House structure consists of

eight columns with an H-section

, which support two

ho rizontal slabs: the floor slab, located 1.6 m above

ground level

and the roof plate, at 2.9 m above the floor

(Fig. 10). The columns are arranged in two parallel gan-

tries 8.8 m apart. And each portico is made up of four

columns, separated by 6.7 m, and two overhangs of 1.7 m

at the ends. The main beams are arranged in the longitu-

dinal direction of the house, with a maximum span of

8WF35 columns as per American classifications. 8.12-inch web,

8.027-inch flanges, weighing 35-pound/foot. Ground floor joists are

12WF58 profiles. 12.19-inch web, 10.014-inch flanges, weighing 58 pounds/ft.

Roof deck joists are 12WF27 profiles. 11.96 inch web, 6.5 inch

flanges,

weighing 27 lbs/ft. Finally, the main joists, which are visible on the

facades, are 15C50 profiles. 15-inch web, 3.716-inch flanges and 50 lb/ft

[20, p. 44]. The mechanical and dimensional features of the profiles have

been obtained from [21, pp. 10–21].

According to Jean Louis Cohen, there were two versions,

a house resting on the ground and the one finally chosen, which was

elevated, not only to have better views, but also to avoid flooding from

the river [22, p. 99].

Fig. 9. Promontory Apartments

(photo by A. Cervilla García, September 2012)

Il. 9. Promontory Apartments

(fot. A. Cervilla García, wrzesień 2012)

22 Alejandro Cervilla García

6.7 m, and the slab in the transverse direction, with a span

of 8.8 m

. It is strange that the span of the slab is greater

than that of the portico but, as we shall see, it is not the

only singularity of this structure. The main beams have

a C-shaped section, with a depth of 15 in., and are welded

tangentially to the interior flange of the columns, and the

beams of the slab are H-shaped profiles with a depth of

12 in., arranged every 1.675 m.

One conclusion we can draw from analyzing the struc-

ture of the house is that the roof plate has a far lesser load

than the ground floor slab. The roof joists are supporting

the slab’s own weight and snow overload. Ground floor

joists are supporting the weight of the floor slab, flooring,

partition walls, glass enclosure and service overload. That’s

why the 12WF58 ground floor joists have a stronger capac-

ity than the 12WF27 roof joists. However, in both cases

their web is very similar, approximately 12 in ches. And

this decision is crucial, because it allows Mies to visually

match the two slabs.

In the Farnsworth House, abstraction rules over struc-

tural expression. The structural reality tells us that the

roof slab bears less stress than the ground floor slab and,

therefore, its thickness could be less than that of the

ground floor slab. The structural reality requires two

floors with unequal edges. And yet Mies has chosen the

same thickness for his two slabs. The same visual weight.

Two abstract planes independent of their different gravita-

tional situation. Two visually interchangeable, and there-

fore universal, planes

The dimensions in inches are as follows: Ground floor level +

5 feet. Distance between columns 22 feet. Overhangs 5 ft 7 in. Roof

deck width 28 ft 8 in. Distance between joists 5 ft 6 in.

The gravitational loads of the roof slab include the actual weight

of the beams, 0.4 kN/m; the actual weight of the beams, 0.73 kN/m;

the beam filling; a compression layer of 5 cm of cement mortar; and

the snow overload, which can be estimated at 1 kN/m

. The gravitational

loads of the ground floor slab include the actual weight of the beams,

0.85 kN/m; the actual weight of the beams, 0.73 kN/m; the beam filling;

a 25 cm thick layer of light concrete; a 5 cm layer of cement mor tar; the

travertine marble pavement, 1 kN/m

; and a service overload of 2 kN/m

in which the weight of the partition walls, furniture and enclosure could

be included. The corresponding construction details on the com position

of these elements can be consulted in [23]. Clearly, the

gra vitational loads

of the ground floor slab are greater than those of the roof slab, hence the

difference in inertia between the roof joists and the ground floor joists.

The 12WF27 roof joists have an inertia of 8490.56 cm

. Ground floor

joists 12WF58 have an inertia of 19805.76 cm

In both cases, the web

An analysis of the structure with Finite Element pro-

gramming informs us that the position of the columns and

beams is correct (Fig. 11). However, their resilient capa-

city is not pushed to the limit under any circumstan-

ces. And their deformations are well within what is ad-

missible. Only the joists of the roof slab are well utilized,

reaching 80% of their resistance capacity, and with de-

formations within the limit of what is acceptable

. We

may well think that it is precisely these roof beams that

determine the dimensions of the structure of the house.

Their 12-inch web demands a 15-inch edge beam for con-

cealment purposes, including the different layers that

make up the slab and roof. And curiously, the columns

that support these beams measure 8 inches, prac tically

half the edge of the beams. Perhaps Mies was look ing for

a 1/2 relationship between the edge of the beams and the

width of the pillars? Very probably, but we consider that

this idea should be the subject of a more detailed study.

What we would like to focus on here is how the forward

position of the pillars with respect to the beams affects the

structure. And it is this structural detail that makes the

transmission of the load between beams and columns ec-

centric. It introduces an additional effort onto the columns,

a moment (Fig. 12). This is something that does not hap-

pen, for example, when the Gothic architect decides to

move the buttresses of his cathedral forward. In that case,

the forward buttress is in favor of the structure. It is

brought forward precisely to favor its function as a sup-

port, next to the buttress, which sustains the horizontal

thrust of the vaults. But Mies, with his forward column,

disrupts the behavior of the structure. And he does it in

favor of an idea. However small that eccentric moment

may be, it is there.

The tangential intersection between the column and the

beam (Fig. 13) is central to this house. Tangential weld-

ing. When Mies brings the columns forward, when he

places them in front of the slabs, he is avoiding the idea

of sustaining, whose Latin origin comes from sustinere,

“to have something above oneself” [24, p. 534]. The co-

lumn does not have the beam over it. It does not sustain

size is virtually the same, to constructively accommodate the 15-inch

web of the edge beam.

According to the structural calculation carried out by Pilar

Sañudo Tinoco. The columns are operating at 43% of their capacity. The

main girders at 43%. And the ground floor joists at 33%.

Fig. 10. Structure of Farnsworth House (drawing by Eduardo Mantovani [20, p. 44])

Il. 10. Konstrukcja Farnsworth House (rys. Eduardo Mantovani [20, s. 44])

The skin and bones of structure /Szkielet i obudowa 23

it, at least not visually. Apparently the column only touch-

es the beam. The flange of the H-profile is tangential to

the web of the C-profile. The two faces are touching with-

out intersecting. This is a subtle but very intense gesture

of structural poetics.

This contact between column and steel beam is con-

trary to the contact between architrave and column in the

Parthenon, which accounts for the transition of the load.

The stone beam of the Parthenon rests on the column

apparently without further ado

. The clarity with which

the elements of this classical structure relate to each other

vanishes in the Farnsworth, in the equivocal and tangen-

tial encounter between the column and the beam. We do

not even see the C-shaped beam. The abstraction of this

junction is total. There is neither support nor intersection:

just tangency. An almost immaterial union. The result is

As Viollet le Duc says: The Greek architect wants to reveal to

the whole world that the different parts of his monument fulfil a useful

and necessary function. It is not enough for his monument to be solid;

he wants it also to appear so [17, p. 48]. Hegel endorses this idea when

he tells us that what is peculiar to Greek architecture is that it empha-

sizes the act of sustaining, as such: In Greek architecture what is char-

acteristic and developed is the column and the architrave that horizon-

tally rests on it. Here one has to speak in terms of rest and support [25,

p. 499]. In Farnsworth House, Mies ignores the narrative of the transi-

tion between beam and column. Not only is there no intermediary capi-

tal, but both beam and column appear independent, without any direct

support of the beam on the column.

that the column does not lose its integrity, but rises up-

wards in all its height. Without unions or intersections

altering it, the column remains independent in its form.

And behind the column the roof plate seems to float. This

so lution achieves its greatest effect when we are in the

house, under the roof deck. It is from the inside, and not

from the outside, that the plate seems to float the most:

where the welding is not visible. Where we see the co-

lumn on which the plate does not rest. Where the edges of

the plate are cut away against the sky and against the for-

est. Although the situation of the columns is the oppo-

site to that of the columns of Villa Tugendhat, the desired

effect is the same: the suspension of the roof deck in the

air. But if in Tugendhat the weightlessness effect was

greater when we looked at the house from the outside,

here the weightlessness effect is greater when we are in-

side the house.

What we see is Mies’s acceptance that structural ele-

ments are more than just structure. They are beauti ful

in themselves, and so are their unions. And the crite ria

the German architect uses to define them go beyond strict

structural mechanics. Unlike Villa Tugendhat, Mies

no longer needs to case the structure in chrome-plated

sheet steel. He no longer sees the need to clad his cruci-

form columns. That uncoated column that Mies used

in the kitchen of Villa Tugendhat, that column that re-

mained in the background in the service area, is now

a cornerstone.

Fig. 11. Above: diagram of moments produced by the combination of gravitational loads in kN/m.

Below: diagram of moments produced by the wind load in both directions.

It can be seen how the most unfavorable moment for the columns is caused by the wind force in the Y direction

(drawing by Pilar Sañudo Tinoco)

Il. 11. Powyżej: wykres momentów zginających pochodzących od kombinacji obciążeń grawitacyjnych [w kN/m].

Poniżej: wykres momentów zginających pochodzących od obciążenia wiatrem w obu kierunkach.

Widoczne jest, że najniekorzystniejszy moment zginający w słupach wynika z działania wiatru w kierunku Y

(rys. Pilar Sañudo Tinoco)

24 Alejandro Cervilla García

The steel cage

From Farnsworth House onwards, Mies always places

columns on the outside of his houses. He does this, for

example, with his 50 × 50 feet house, which unfortunately

he did not manage to build. And not content with the col-

umn, he decided to multiply it, and turn the structure of

his houses into a real steel cage (Fig. 14). This was the last

housing model Mies tried. From the prototype of steel

prefabricated homes in a row, to the Lafayette Park homes

in Detroit, through McCormick House, Morris Greenwald

Fig. 13. The tangent union between column and beam in Farnsworth House (photo by A. Cervilla García, September 2012)

Il. 13. Styczne połączenie belki ze słupem w Farnsworth House (fot. A. Cervilla García, wrzesień 2012)

House and Herbert Greenwald House. A transportable

steel cage manufactured in the workshop, derived from

the enclosure system that Mies used in the Lake Shore

Drive Apartments. H-section columns are welded to the

flat roof and the floor slab without touching the ground.

Can there be a better example of gravitational illusion

than a column that appears not to reach its foundation?

And as in Farnsworth, these columns do not take full ad-

vantage of their load-bearing capacity. Here the steel co-

lumns are arranged every 1.7 m, supporting a beam of

with a span of 8.4 m. For every two columns, one beam.

Mies designed his last home in the late 1950s. More

than fifty years had passed from the hidden structure of

the Riehl House to the visible structural cage of the La-

fayette Park townhouses.

Conclusion

Detlef Mertins acknowledges that Mies has become

more complex and contradictory for us than he was for his

early critics: In retrospect, his trajectory was less inexo-

rable and more contingent upon changing contexts, chal-

lenges, clients and collaborators [26, prologue].

And I can only agree with that appraisal. Let’s go back

for a moment to Mies’s first house, the Riehl house, with

its embossed pilasters. The columns were already on the

facade, but as a decoration. They were false columns.

False brick embossed pilasters. And in the Farnsworth,

the column returns to the facade, as in the Riehl, but in

Fig. 12. Stress difference with centered load and with eccentric load

(drawing by A. Cervilla García)

Il. 12. Różnica wartości naprężeń pochodzących od obciążenia

osiowego i mimośrodowego (rys. A. Cervilla García)

The skin and bones of structure /Szkielet i obudowa 25

References /Bibliografia

[1] Spaeth D., Mies van der Rohe, Rizzoli International Publications,

New York 1985.

[2] Blake P., The master builders, W.W. Norton, New York 1976.

[3] Simonnet C., Hormigón; Historia de un material, Editorial Nerea,

San Sebastian 2009, 54–62.

[4] Addis B., 3000 years of design engineering and construction,

Phaidon Press, London 2009.

[5] Summerson J., El lenguaje clásico de la arquitectura, Gustavo

Gili, Barcelona, 1963, 25–49.

[6] Kostof S., Historia de la Arquitectura, Alianza, Madrid, 2007, 224.

[7] Mies van der Rohe. Casas. 2G Revista internacional de arquitec-

tura, nº 48–49, Barcelona, August 2009.

[8] Schulze F., Mies van der Rohe. A critical biography, University of

Chicago Press, Chicago 1985.

[9] Frampton K., Historia crítica de la Arquitectura Moderna, Edi-

torial Gustavo Gili, Barcelona 1980.

[10] Johnson Ph., Mies van der Rohe, MoMA, New York 1947.

[11] Frampton K., Estudios sobre cultura tectónica, Ediciones Akal,

Madrid 1995.

[12] Solá Morales I., Cirici C., Ramos C., Mies van der Rohe. Barcelona

Pavilion, Gustavo Gili, Barcelona 2002.

[13] VVAA, Mies van der Rohe-Barcelona 1929, TENOV, Barcelona

2018.

[14] Norberg-Schulz Ch., Los principios de la Arquitectura Moderna,

Editorial Reverté, Barcelona 2005.

[15] Vitaskova J., Tugendhat Villa, Tugendhat Villa Foundation, Brno

2009, 15.

[16] Campo Baeza A., The Built Idea, Fundación COAM, Madrid 1996.

[17]

Viollet le Duc E.-E., Conversaciones sobre la Arquitectura, CGATE,

Madrid 2007.

[18] Neumeyer F., The secret life of columns, [w:] Mies van der Rohe

Barcelona 1929, TENOV, Barcelona 2018, 105.

[19] Tegethoff W., Mies van der Rohe. The Villas and Country Houses,

MIT Press, Cambridge 1985.

[20] Mantovani E., Mies’ two-way span. Ph.D. Thesis, Director: Cristina

Gastón Guirao, UPC, Barcelona 2015.

[21] VVAA, Hot rolled carbón steel structural shapes, United States

Steel, Chicago 1948.

[22] Cohen J.L., Mies van der Rohe, Akal Arquitectura, Madrid 1998.

[23] Vandenberg M., Farnsworth house. Architecture in Detail, Phai-

don, New York 2003.

[24] Coromines J., Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Castellana,

Edi torial Gredos, Madrid 2012.

[25] Hegel G.W.F., Lecciones sobre la Estética, Ediciones Akal, Madrid

2007.

[26] Mertins D., Mies, Phaidon Press, London 2014.

Fig. 14. Steel cage-type facade, in which Mies multiplies

the number of columns (Hedrich-Blessing [10, p. 178])

Il. 14. Stalowa fasada typu klatkowego, w której Mies zwielokrotnia

liczbę kolumn (Hedrich-Blessingg [10, s. 178])

a very different way. It is still a decorative element, but no

longer in the classical or neoclassical style of the Riehl.

It is a modern decorative element. Slightly shifted from

its place, as we have already explained, the Farnsworth

column becomes a sustaining element capable of produc-

ing an undeniable gravitational illusion. Mies no longer

needs to paint or coat the column, as he did in Krefeld and

Brno. A simple displacement turns the standard steel

H-profile into an artistic element.

The mechanical capacity of the structure is not what

most interests Mies. Mies is not a structural rationalist.

Although he admired Berlage for the honesty of his con-

struction, the truth is that he did not apply the same prin-

ciples of constructive honesty to his houses. Although

he worked for much of his career with structure as a guid-

ing rule, the search for greater mechanical efficiency never

figured among his ideals. This does not mean that Mies

disdains the mechanical function of structure, but rather

that he is interested above all in its illusory function. And

if in Tugendhat he has to resort to cladding the column, or

its inefficient cross-shape, in Farnsworth he presents us

with a pure and hard column, mechani cally efficient and

without cladding of any kind. It is the most difficult yet.

There are only two master tricks: its forward position in

relation to the girder and its tangential connection to the

beam. And in the McCormick house there is one more step.

Here the column does not reach the ground. It is tangential

not only to the beams and slabs, but also to the foundation,

which it does not actually touch, only indirectly.

Only a master would dare to construct a gravitational

illusion for all to see. And the journey that the structure

underwent in Mies’s houses, from its hidden to its forward

position, lasted the necessary length of time for our

German master to allow that idea to mature. The master of

structures, according to Blake, uses structures as a decora-

tive artifice, without losing their necessary supporting ca-

pacity. Mies shows us that one can be both rational and an

artist. One can seek coherence and poetry at the same time.

One can be contradictory (that is, human), and masterful

Translated from Spanish by Penelope Eades. Structure consul-

tant: Pilar Sañudo Tinoco, architect.

26 Alejandro Cervilla García

Abstract

Mies van der Rohe is considered one of the great masters of the 20

century, both for the coherence of his work and for his ability to make modern

architecture based on the importance of structure. This is recognized by the architect and architectural critic, Peter Blake, in the chapter he devoted

to Mies van der Rohe, entitled The Mastery of Structure, in his “Masters of Architecture” series. In the present article we would like to analyze the

evolution of the image of structure in the houses of Mies van der Rohe, from his very first dwelling, Riehl House, built in Berlin in 1907, to his last

house, Morris Greenwald, built in Weston in 1953. We will see how structure underwent a radical transformation over this period progressing from

the innermost hidden realm of Architecture outwards to its exterior, and how in this process, the German maestro managed to transcend the idea of

structure and its load-bearing capability to convert it into the main artistic element of his architecture.

Key words: Mies van der Rohe, Riehl House, Mosler House, Esters House, Lange House, Weissenhofsiedlung, Wolf House, Tugendhat House,

Farnsworth House, structure

Streszczenie

Mies van der Rohe uważany jest za jednego z wielkich mistrzów XX w., zarówno z powodu spójności jego pracy, jak i jego zdolności do tworze-

nia nowoczesnej architektury opartej na znaczeniu konstrukcji. Zostało to docenione w serii „Mistrzowie architektury” przez architekta i kryty-

ka Petera Blake’a w rozdziale poświęconym Miesowi van der Rohe, zatytułowanym Mistrzostwo konstrukcji. W niniejszym artykule chcieli-

byśmy przeanalizować ewolucję wizerunku konstrukcji w domach Miesa van der Rohe od jego pierwszego miejsca zamieszkania, Domu

Riehla, zbudowanego w Berlinie w 1907 r., aż do ostatniego domu, Morrisa Greenwalda, zbudowanego w Weston w 1953 r. Zobaczymy, w jaki

sposób konstrukcja uległa radykalnej transformacji w tym okresie, przechodząc od najgłębszej ukrytej sfery architektury do sfery zewnętrznej, i jak

w tym procesie udało się niemieckiemu mistrzowi przekroczyć ideę konstrukcji i jej nośności w celu przekształcenia w główny element artystyczny

jego architektury.

Słowa kluczowe: Mies van der Rohe, Riehl House, Mosler House, Esters House, Lange House, Weissenhofsiedlung, Wolf House, Tugendhat House,

Farnsworth House, konstrukcja