news
NEW SECTION: Toolkit for Owners of a Modern House
13 Aalto Sites Nominated for UNESCO World Heritage
Pioneers of the Dutch Modern House
Business Cards of Stone, Timber and Concrete in the Brussels Region 1830-1970
Villa Beer At Risk
Exhibiting & Visiting Modernist Monuments
Fostering Well-Researched Responsible Design
ICONS AT RISK
Enjoy a virtual visit to the California House and a Q&A with architect Peter Gluck
Exhibition 'Modernism and Refuge'
A Hidden Gem of Postmodernism
July - Iconic Houses Month
New Centre for Historic Houses of India
An Online Chronicle of the Douglas House
SPECIAL – Northern (High)Lights!
SPECIAL - Casas Icónicas en España!
SPECIAL - Vacances en France!
SPECIAL – Iconic Dreams - Sleep in an Iconic House!
SPECIAL – Dutch Delights!
SPECIAL – German Greats!
Villa Henny, geometric style icon in The Netherlands
A Mendini temple in Amsterdam
IH-lectures USA & Canada Feb 2020 on Melnikov House
An Afternoon with the Glucks
Danish Moderns – Looking Back at Our Mini-Seminar
Venturo house complements Exhibition Centre WeeGee’s offering
Lecture report: Remembering Richard Neutra
Hôtel Mezzara and the Guimard Museum project
We welcome 13 new members!
BREAKING NEWS: 8 Wright Sites Inscribed on Unesco World Heritage List!
LECTURE 29 August - Raymond Neutra: My Father and Frank Lloyd Wright
Iconic Reads
SPECIAL – Iconic Artist Residencies
Our Badge of Honour
SPECIAL – Women & Iconic Houses
SPECIAL – Iconic Housing
Iconic Houses End Year Message
City-ordered rebuild of landmark house stirs debate: Appropriate or overreach?
Kohlberg House Restoration in Progress
Planned Demolition of Rietveld Homes in Reeuwijk
Renovation Gili House in Crisis
An Iconic Saga
Restoring Eileen Gray’s Villa E-1027 and Clarifying the Controversies
Modernism on the East Coast
Iconic Houses in Latin America
House Tours May 2018
Expert Meetings
Terence Riley -KEYNOTE SPEAKER- on Philip Johnson
New era for Villa E-1027 and Cap Moderne
Jorge Liernur -KEYNOTE SPEAKER- on Latin American Modernism(s)
Restoring the past: The Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo Home Studio
Behind the Scenes: Hendrick de Keyser Association
Latin America Special – Focus on Mexico
De Stijl in Drachten
Preserving the Nancarrow House-Studio
Meet the Friends - Nanne de Ru
Latin America Special – Focus on Brazil
Jan de Jong’s House is Latest Hendrick de Keyser Acquisition
Stay in a Belgian Modernist Masterpiece
In Berlin’s Modernist Network
Rietveld-Schröder House Celebrates De Stijl Anniversary
Meet Our New Foundation Board Members
Virtual Tour of a Papaverhof Home in 3D
Getty Grant for Villa E-1027
Iconic Dacha
11 Le Corbusier Homes now on Unesco World Heritage List
At home with Le Corbusier
Wright Plus 2016 Walk
Speaking Volumes: Building the Iconic Houses Library
Follow us!
Documentary La Ricarda
Rent a house designed by Gerrit Rietveld
Barragán House on Screen
Gesamtkunstwerk – An Icon on the Move
Triennale der Moderne 27 September - 13 October 2013
Prestigious Art Nouveau mansions in Brussels open
September 14 + 15: Heritage Days in Paris
June's New Arrivals: Museum Apartments
Iconic Houses is now on Twitter and Facebook
Corbu’s Cabanon: Reconstruction and Lecture
Projekt Mies In Krefeld: Life-sized model of the Krefeld Clubhouse
New arrivals: Spain special
MAMO: Le Corbu’s ‘Park in the Sky’ open 12 June
Annual Wright Architectural Housewalk: 18 May
Frank Lloyd Wright Homes on Screen
Message from the Editor
Neutra’s House on Screen
Melnikov House on Screen
Iconic Houses in the media
Message from the Editor
Eileen Gray House on Screen
Copy Culture
At Home in the 20th Century
New 20th century Iconic Houses website launches
13 Aalto Sites Nominated for UNESCO World Heritage
Finland is updating its tentative list in line with the World Heritage Agreement. The process supports Alvar Aalto Foundation’s long-term work on preserving and protecting architectural heritage.
In the first phase, the proposal consists of 13 modern Finnish buildings or districts designed by Alvar Aalto’s architecture studio, which form a coherent whole that, according to the experts’ assessment, has a chance of inclusion in the World Heritage List. The set of sites may change during the production of the actual World Heritage List proposal. Four of the thirteen nominated sites are member houses of the Iconic Houses Network. The nominated sites are: Studio Aalto; The Aalto House; Finlandia Hall; Social Insurance Institution Main Office; House of Culture; University of Jyväskylä, Aalto Campus; Muuratsalo Experimental House; Paimio Sanatorium; Seinäjoki Civic Centre; Sunila Pulp Mill Residential Area; Säynätsalo Town Hall; Villa Mairea; and the Church of the Three Crosses, aka Vuoksenniska Church.
This series of modern sites designed by Alvar Aalto’s architecture studio have been included in the Finnish Tentative list because Finland believes they have a good chance of becoming inscribed in the World Heritage List. Aalto’s buildings represent the global cultural heritage of the Modern Movement, while at the same time reflecting the development of the construction of the Finnish welfare state and a comprehensive design approach.
“Aalto already began moving away from mechanistic functionalism early on, in the 1930s. The focal point of the design became the user – the individual and the community – whose overall wellbeing was targeted with the aid of architecture. This humane approach attracted international attention and appreciation right from the start, and this trend significantly influenced the development of Finnish architecture – and still does today,” says Alvar Aalto Foundation architect Jonas Malmberg.
In the year 2000, the Alvar Aalto Foundation made a decision to propose Aalto’s architecture for the World Heritage List and, on the centenary of Alvar Aalto’s birth in 1998, proposed the official protection of all of Aalto’s buildings. The Foundation’s long-term work on preserving and protecting architectural heritage has expanded into a fruitful collaboration with an international network of Alvar Aalto cities.
“The Alvar Aalto Foundation supports the pursuit of World Heritage status. The full series is still limited, and in practice cannot include all the sites that are considered important. Nevertheless, it will add to interest in Aalto’s production as a whole, and in the Finnish architectural heritage. World Heritage offers a variety of opportunities for architecture education, exhibitions and events, tourism, built heritage work, and international collaboration.” Lindh says.
"The Iconic Houses Network wholeheartedly supports the nomination of the Aalto sites and would be delighted and also finds it more than logical for Alvar Aalto to join the premier league of architecture on the World Heritage List as the most important representative of Nordic Modernism. Taken together, even only his houses offer a wonderful insight into a 50-year career characterized by a style that blended modernism and traditional vernacular architecture and featured natural materials and organic forms.' Natascha Drabbe says.
The UNESCO World Heritage List currently includes significant houses from the 20th-Century by eight architects that are represented in the Iconic Houses Network: Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Bruno Taut, Victor Horta, Antoni Gaudí, Luis Barragán and Gerrit Rietveld.
Four of our member houses of the seventeen inscribed works by the Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier:
- Cité Frugès, Pessac, France, 1924;
- Weissenhof-Siedlung house, Stuttgart, Germany, 1927;
- Villa Savoye and gardener’s lodge, Poissy, France, 1928;
- Cabanon de Le Corbusier, Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France, 1951.
We are proud that three of our member houses are inscribed as part of the eight buildings that represent the 20th-Century Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright in the United States:
- Fallingwater, Mill Run, PA, 1939;
- Hollyhock House, Los Angeles, CA, 1921;
- Frederick C. Robie House, Chicago, IL, 1910.
Housing Estates are represented by Taut’s Home in the ‘Horseshoe Estate’ by Bruno Taut in Berlin. Also the Horta Museum is inscribed as part of the Major Town Houses of Victor Horta in Brussels; our member Casa Milá/La Pedrera is UNESCO World Heritage as part of the Works of Antoni Gaudí in Barcelona; and last but not least these single houses, Villa Tugendhat by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in Brno, Luis Barragán House and Studio in Mexico-City and the Rietveld Schröder House in Utrecht are joining this premiere league in architecturally signifcant works.
For further information about World Heritage follow the link to the UNESCO website.
Posted 18 March 2021