Josef Hoffmann | 1. “I admit everything practical and necessary,” said Josef Hoffmann, “but I also think that we always have a duty to give pleasure.” Hoffmann’s insistence on fusing practicality with pleasure defined his work throughout a long and prolific career as one of the most influential Austrian architects and designers of the early 20th century.
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Born in Moravia on 15 December 1870, he was encouraged by his father, a prosperous textile manufacturer and mayor of their town, to become a civil servant or lawyer, and was educated accordingly. He felt so dejected by his studies, and by his father’s plans for his future, that he insisted on pursuing his cultural interests and enrolled at the Higher School of Arts and Crafts in Brno. Having excelled there, he moved to Vienna in 1892 to study architecture under the charismatic Otto Wagner at the Academy of Fine Arts. Hoffmann swiftly befriended like-minded students including Carl Otto Czeschka, Koloman Moser and Joseph Maria Olbrich with whom he founded the Siebener Club, a forerunner of the Vienna Secession. He also won the prestigious Prix de Rome for his graduation project, and studied in Italy for a year, before returning to Austria.
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Vienna was then one of the world’s largest and most powerful cities as the political and economic heart of the vast Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Hoffmann flung himself into its dynamic cultural scene. Sharing Wagner’s commitment to defining a new approach to designing buildings and their contents, he experimented with the latest materials and production techniques. Yet Hoffmann was equally passionate about reinventing traditional craftsmanship, and forged productive collaborations with skilled Viennese artisans throughout his working life.

A #Repost from @alice.rawsthorn wonderful Instagram "newletter", which regularly gives deep insights into design/history.

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#Repost - @connolly
#lobmeyrambassador the original Martini
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