Trend-Setting Contemporary Architects : Germany

Today Germany has more and more examples of modern innovative architecture which are nevertheless in tune with human needs. Many a superb building still owes its origination to the style and philosophy of the Bauhaus. But more recent trends in architecture have also resulted in the construction of remarkable buildings, such as high-tech buildings in which important functional elements such as elevators, escalators and supply lines have been moved to the outside of the structure, where (often painted different colors) they concurrently serve as decoration. Today other forms of ornamentation such as capitals, cornices and ornaments in the Art Deco style are being used in a greater variety of ways as eye-catchers in the sense of architecture as art, breaking away from the postulate of architecture as mere fulfillment of function.
Germany’s top echelon of architects includes:

j>Gottfried Bohm, who in 1986 became the first German to win the Pritzker Architecture Prize;
j>Gunter Behnisch, who designed not only the buildings and grounds for the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich but also the new plenary chamber of the German Bundestag in Bonn;
j>Frei Otto, who made a name for himself in the fields of flexible suspended roof construction and ecologically oriented building;

5>Oswald Mathias Ungers, whose buildings exhibit a severely geometric design;
>Josef Paul Kleihues and Hardt-Waltherr Hamer, who as planning directors of the International Building Exhibition in Berlin have profoundly influenced both the discussion of new architecture (Kleihues) and the treatment of residential units in old buildings (Hamer);
>Karljosef Schattner, who as the diocesan master builder in the small Franconian town of Eichstatt created a particularly successful symbiosis of existing and new architecture; and
£>Thomas Herzog, who has devoted particular attention to resource-efficient building and solar architecture.
Prominent German architects are presently playing a relatively minor role abroad, with a few notable exceptions: Josef Paul Kleihues is building a museum in Chicago, and Helmut Jahn (who built the 256-meter-high tower at the Frankfurt am Main exhibition site) works on projects all over the world from his Chicago base.