Wagner, Martin

Wagner, Martin (1885–1957). German architect and planner. His reputation was made in the field of low-cost industrialized housing in Berlin, he himself designed little, and was essentially an enabler. A member of Der Ring and active in the Deutscher Werkbund, he collaborated with several Modern Movement architects, including Gropius, Häring, Mies van der Rohe, Poelzig, and Scharoun, and was a pioneer of the International Modern style. His best-known housing schemes were the Lindenhof Estate, Berlin-Schöneberg (1918–21—destroyed 1944), and the Britz, known as the Hufeisensiedlung (Horse Shoe Estate) at Berlin-Neukölln (1925–30—with Bruno Taut). He also worked with Bartning, Häring, and Gropius on the Siemensstadt Housing Development, Berlin (1927). He left Germany for Turkey in 1935, and in 1938, through Gropius's influence, joined the staff of Harvard University, USA, where he taught planning until 1950. He published many (usually polemical) works on architecture and planning throughout his career, promoting his left-wing views.

Bibliography

Jane Turner (1996);
M. Wagner (1918, 1923, 1925, 1929, 1932)