DOI issue:
Division II. Germany
DOI article:Deubner, Ludwig: German architecture an decoration
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.37423#0167
GERMAN ARCHITECTURE AND DECORATION
designer who, as the result of a thorough training in handicraft,
understands his material and its manipulation to perfection. They
testify to a strong feeling for the amenities of domestic life, for the
comfort of a middle-class household of but modest means. His
articles of furniture have the simplest possible form, and, like the
bookcase in the living room, which also serves the purpose of a
writing desk, or the buffet, which consists of four separate sections
easily taken apart, and is none the less quite stable, are well thought
out as regards construction, even down to the smallest detail (page 173).
At the same time they possess a certain quiet charm, which is even
discernible in the flower-table, simple and practical as its form is, and
which, joined with a discreet colour treatment (page 171), saves his
rooms from that banality of appearance which is so often associated
with the “ modern ” interior.
Alfred Altherr, who designed the room for the president of the
Elberfeld Chamber of Commerce, which is shown among our illus-
trations (page 158), is a teacher at the School of Applied Art in that
town. Active in the most diverse industrial spheres, he has exerted
a marked influence on Rhenish applied art, with its rooted con-
servatism. He has found an emulator in Hermann Muenchhausen,
who has co-operated with the W. Dittmar’s Furniture Factory in the
imperial capital, where the bulk of the inhabitants live in flats or
tenements. In order to demonstrate how agreeably and comfortably
the rooms of these dwellings—constructed for the most part by
speculative builders intent only on a good return for their outlay, and
usually lacking in taste—could be fitted up, they have for some years
past arranged small but select exhibitions in the rooms of Berlin
tenements, making a special feature of portable but attractive furni-
ture and its arrangement in the space available, the careful selection
of papers, hangings and carpets, the treatment of the windows, and so
forth. Among our illustrations is shown a really cosy bedroom, and a
comfortable sofa-recess in a sitting-room, in which the beautiful grain
of the birch wood produces a telling effect (page 179).
In houses owned by the occupants greater congruity and solidity
are, of course, attainable by means of permanent fixtures and panel-
ling. Such is the case with the dining-room which Ernst Fried-
mann has so cleverly and tastefully equipped (page 165). The sideboard
fitments at the narrow end of the oval-shaped room and the glass
cabinets flanking them impart a certain rhythm and order to the
apartment and make it appear more roomy than it really is. The
bedroom fitted up by the Hofmobelfabrik Ludwig Alter at Darm-
stadt (page 157) from a design of their own is admirable in its
proportions, while a feeling of warmth and tranquillity is imparted
*53
designer who, as the result of a thorough training in handicraft,
understands his material and its manipulation to perfection. They
testify to a strong feeling for the amenities of domestic life, for the
comfort of a middle-class household of but modest means. His
articles of furniture have the simplest possible form, and, like the
bookcase in the living room, which also serves the purpose of a
writing desk, or the buffet, which consists of four separate sections
easily taken apart, and is none the less quite stable, are well thought
out as regards construction, even down to the smallest detail (page 173).
At the same time they possess a certain quiet charm, which is even
discernible in the flower-table, simple and practical as its form is, and
which, joined with a discreet colour treatment (page 171), saves his
rooms from that banality of appearance which is so often associated
with the “ modern ” interior.
Alfred Altherr, who designed the room for the president of the
Elberfeld Chamber of Commerce, which is shown among our illus-
trations (page 158), is a teacher at the School of Applied Art in that
town. Active in the most diverse industrial spheres, he has exerted
a marked influence on Rhenish applied art, with its rooted con-
servatism. He has found an emulator in Hermann Muenchhausen,
who has co-operated with the W. Dittmar’s Furniture Factory in the
imperial capital, where the bulk of the inhabitants live in flats or
tenements. In order to demonstrate how agreeably and comfortably
the rooms of these dwellings—constructed for the most part by
speculative builders intent only on a good return for their outlay, and
usually lacking in taste—could be fitted up, they have for some years
past arranged small but select exhibitions in the rooms of Berlin
tenements, making a special feature of portable but attractive furni-
ture and its arrangement in the space available, the careful selection
of papers, hangings and carpets, the treatment of the windows, and so
forth. Among our illustrations is shown a really cosy bedroom, and a
comfortable sofa-recess in a sitting-room, in which the beautiful grain
of the birch wood produces a telling effect (page 179).
In houses owned by the occupants greater congruity and solidity
are, of course, attainable by means of permanent fixtures and panel-
ling. Such is the case with the dining-room which Ernst Fried-
mann has so cleverly and tastefully equipped (page 165). The sideboard
fitments at the narrow end of the oval-shaped room and the glass
cabinets flanking them impart a certain rhythm and order to the
apartment and make it appear more roomy than it really is. The
bedroom fitted up by the Hofmobelfabrik Ludwig Alter at Darm-
stadt (page 157) from a design of their own is admirable in its
proportions, while a feeling of warmth and tranquillity is imparted
*53