May, Ernst
May, Ernst (1886–1970). German architect and disciple of the Garden City movement, he studied first in London (1907–8), then in Darmstadt (1908–10), before working with Unwin (1910–12). He completed his studies in Munich under Fischer and Thiersch (1912–13). Director of the Silesian Building Department, Breslau (now Wrocław), from 1919 to 1925, he produced the Development Plan for the City, and had to deal with the huge influx of German refugees from Poland. From 1925 to 1930 he was Stadtbaurat (Director of Town Planning and Building) at Frankfurtam-Main, where he designed the famous Römerstadt Housing Development (1926–30) and other schemes incorporating English low-density ideas with the architectural language of the International Modernist style, using prefabricated industrialized systems. From 1926 to 1930 he edited Das neue Frankfurt (New Frankfurt) and promoted his ideas about housing, transport, and pollution as well as publishing proposals for Berlin and planning generally. He moved to the Soviet Union in 1930, where he planned a series of new towns (the ‘May’ towns). From 1934 until 1945 he was in Africa, farming in Tanganyika and practising as an architect-planner in Kenya, but was interned as an enemy alien in 1940–2. Returning to Europe in 1953, he carried out many housing developments in Hamburg and elsewhere in West Germany. He edited Das schlesische Heim (The Silesian Home—1919–25) and Die Neue Heimat (The New Homeland—1954–60).
Bibliography
Architectural Association, xi/1 (1979), 39–62;
Buekschmitt (1963);
Kalman (1994);
Fischer & Höpfner (1986);
Herrel (2001);
Korn (1953);
Me. Miller (1992);
Jane Turner (1996)
More From encyclopedia.com
Sir Raymond Unwin , Unwin, Sir Raymond (1863–1940). English town-planner, the most influential of his time. Influenced by William Morris and by Socialist ideas, he was l… Karl Friedrich Schinkel , Schinkel, Karl Friedrich
Schinkel, Karl Friedrich (1781–1841). Prussian architect, the greatest in Germany in the first half of C19. He was not only… Palladianism , Palladianism. Classical style based on the architecture of the C16 Italian architect Andrea Palladio, disseminated primarily by his Quattro Libri del… Ithiel Town , Ithiel Town (1784-1844)
Source
Bridge builder
Architect. As a boy growing up in rural Connecticut, Ithiel Town excelled at doing the intricate carpen… Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto , Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto
Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (1898-1976) was a Finnish architect, furniture designer and town planner. More broadly, he was a comp… Modern Architecture , Through the nineteenth century and into the early twentieth century, neoclassical architecture predominated in much of Spanish America. In Europe, mo…
You Might Also Like
NEARBY TERMS
May, Ernst