Walter Gropius

Walter Gropius (°Berlin, May 18, 1883 – †Boston, July 5, 1969) was a German (later American) architect.

Gropius started his architecture education in Munich in 1903 and continued it in Berlin. In 1907 he joined Peter Behrens’ architecture office. Three years later he established himself as an independent architect and industrial designer.

At the beginning of March 1919 he succeeded architect Bruno Taut as chairman of the Berlin-based Arbeitsrat für Kunst, a broadly oriented association to promote (international) collaboration between artists and with the aim of making artists aware of their social role in the reconstruction of Europe after the First World War through publications, congresses and exhibitions.

In 1919, Gropius founded the Bauhaus. The Bauhaus remained under his leadership until 1928.

The seizure of power by the Nazis led in 1934 to the departure of Gropius to the United Kingdom. He then moved to the United States in 1937, where he became a professor at Harvard University.

With a number of younger architects, Gropius formed TAC (The Architect Collaborative) in 1945.