eli eliot: Villa Tugendhat - Mies van der Rohe

On Sunday morning we got up super early, at 5.30 p.m., to take a bus and go to Brno. Jan presented me two tickets to visit Villa Tugendhat of Mies van der Rohe as a Christmas gift. I can tell you that when he gave it to me I stared crying! So you can imagine how happy this made me!

Fritz Tugendhat and his wife Grete commissioned to Mies van der Rohe their family home. The plot was given to Greta from her father as a wedding present. They say that Mies was super impressed when he saw the place where the house will be built. The plot is up to a hill where you can be delighted for marvelous views of Brno and its skyline with the Spilberk Castle and the Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul.

The house was designed and built in only 14 months. Mies van der Rohe started working on the project in the summer 1929. At Christmas of 1930 the family moved to the new house where they lived only for 7 years.

Tugendhats were a German Jewish family living in Czechoslovakia. After German Occupation they had to leave the country and also the house.

In 2012 the last reconstruction of the house was finished. Now you can visit the house like it was on Christmas of 1930 where the family started living there with the replicas of the original furniture.

The entrance is from Černopolní Street, the highest floor of the building and where the bedrooms are located. The entrance is emphasized with the stairs’ volume. The door is from Macassar Ebony with travertine floors.

This is the ceiling of the principal stairs in the entry hall.

Mies vander Rohe designed all the furniture in the house and decided where to place it exactly. In the entry hall there are two D42 Cantilever Armchairs and one MR tubular Table. D42 is a classic cantilever chair designed by Mies van der Rohe for the Bauhaus in 1927. The structure is from stainless tubular steel and the wicker-work was created by Lilly Reich, assistant of the architect.

The master bedroom of Grete Tugendhat is next to the bedroom of Fritz Tugendhat, her husband, and with a direct connection with the bedroom of the children. There is a MR tubular Table, a Barcelona Stool and Brno Flat Bar Chair with red leather.

The bathroom of the parents gets the light from windows next to the ceiling. The tiles were manufactured by the Czech tile brand Rako for the bathrooms, kitchen and other services rooms.

This is the room for the smaller kids, the nursery, with the only furniture not designed by Mies van der Rohe. The furniture is from a famous Czech brand.

This is the room for the oldest daughter Hanna with three D42 Cantilever Chairs. The chairs in this room are in a children size.

This was the room of the governess Irene Kalkofen or for the guess when it come someone. In the case a guess comes for a visit the governess stays in the room of Hanna.

This is the terrace with a direct access from the children’s rooms. The semicircular bench is decorated with roses on spring.

With a semicircular stairs we arrive to the main floor where the living room space is. It’s incredible the feeling of light you have everywhere on this house, more enfaces in this floor by the white linoleum floor.

This is a photo taken from the studio of the library area where we can see the piano and the stairs that connect the two main floors on the background.

The living room is a unique space separate with walls of different materials and shapes, or even curtains.

The library is from Makassar ebony. The chairs are the Tugendhat MR70 Chair and Brno Tubular Chairs in white leather.

The wall between the studio-library and the main living space is from onyx stone. The onyx wall is the most expensive thing in the entire house. This stone let the light pass through it, creating a unique light in the studio.

In the lateral façade on this floor there is an indoor garden that makes a transition between the room and the garden.

In the main living room space there are three Tugendhat MR70 Chairs in white, three Barcelona MR90 Chairs in green and a Barcelona Stool. The Tugendhat MR70 Armchair is a cantilever armchair designed by Mies van der Rohe especially for this house. The Barcelona MR90 Chair was designed for the German Pavilion on the International Exposition of 1929 hosted in Barcelona.

Next to this chairs there is a MR Table and a red MR Lounge Chair that works as a landmark on the living space.

The picture was taken from the dining room space. The windows are from the floor to the ceiling and two of them are retractable, they can be open completely on the summer time. The structural pillars are from a cross-section with a polished steel covert; these columns are an important element you can see all around the house.

The dining room table is made in separate pieces to be adapted to the number of commensals. This table is really similar to the one on the Villa Muller of Adolf Loos. The chairs are Brno Tubular Chairs in white leather.

A semicircular wall of Makassar ebony separates the dining area to the rest of living space and also the services rooms (the kitchen, the store room or the preparation room).

The kitchen has a zinc sink with a big windows though you can see a marvelous views.

The steel spiral stairs brings you to the utility floor.

This is an original watching machine from 1930 when the family stared living in the house.

A curious room in the basement, the last room you can find in this building, after crossing the many services room like the laundry room or the photo developing room, there is the fur coats room.