Maison Citrohan, Struttgart, Germany;(1927); Purism
Le
Corbusier began to study purism as he looked into the house as a “machine for
living.” Maison Citrohan was the last of three prototypes, as he looked into a
house with double height spaces that would function seamlessly with the daily
lives of its inhabitance. The three prototypes were the Domino house, the Monol
house, and finally Maison Citrohan. The way the house would function as a
machine is how they were built, in series. Le Corbusier was interested at the
time in industrialization and the machines that began to mass produce products,
and he wanted to do the same for homes, but in doing so he also wanted to
contain the humanist expression inside of the building.
Each house would include a double
height space with two walls, which was inspired by his visual experience of
space inside of popular Paris bars. The houses would include a mezzanine and
have a large light near the darker areas light did not access during the day.
Each house used a simple constructive logic which made them faster and easier
to build. This eventual house was inspired by his logic in the construction of
the domino house and could be laid out side by side such as the Monol house. The
prototype reflects its name from the objectives of its design, Citrohan called
home. Citroen at the time was a car manufacturer, and automobiles were a part
of Le Corbusier’s studies for some time. This house in Le Corbusier’s mind
could be laid out in an assembly line and would be fast and easy to construct
as automobiles were. He proposed that most of the building even be prefabricated,
as to make construction faster.
The house Citron 1, was built in
1920. The building contained three overlapping floors. On the ground floor
there was the living, dining, and in the back, there was the kitchen, and the service. On the
first floor there was the master bedroom in the back with a private bath, and
the boudoir and intimate space. The second floor contained two single bedrooms
with two separate bathrooms, and a garden terrace which would become one of Le Corbusier’s
five points. The stairs stepped up across one of the sidewalls.The third
version came about in 1922. It was raised on pilotis creating a lower level,
that served as a garage, pantry, or some other forms of storage. The pilotis became
one of his second points. The second version is surrounded by a perimeter
balcony, which disappears in his later sketches of domestic architecture since
he believes it hindered the structure of the pure and closed volume which he
was searching for.
In 1925 Le Corbusier was offered the
first opportunity to build his cell Citrohan. The Fruges wanted to test a
proposal site where they would build a neighborhood for their workers and
employees for the industrial city of Pessac. This resulted in Le Corbusier’s
fourth version, which was more economical than the original. Le Corbusier
reduced the surfaces of the prototype and got rid of the double height spaces,
creating a minimum number of used elements. The Houses would be connected back
to back rather than side to side and the ground floors would no longer be on pilotis.
The open entrance through the pilotis was moved to the first floor where there
was an open hall that circulated into a closed hall. The stairs were changed to
circulate on the other wall, on the interior and exterior instead and was used
to separate the living room from the cuisine and service rooms. The second
floor stairs separated the two bedrooms and left the rest of the space to one
bathroom with the minimum dimensions acceptable. The stairs then led to a
landing outside, which lead to another exterior staircase that ended at the
terrace which was half covered in shade. The large double height windows were
replaced with two horizontally elongated windows that occupied the entire width
of the front. This window became a part of Le corbusiers principles.The study
and construction of this house led to Le Corbusier’s fully finished set of guidelines
represented as his five points. He learned the importance of functional pilotis,
a roof garden, elongated windows, and later on would add an open floor plan and
a free façade.
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| Maison Citrohan Floor Plans |
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| Dom-ino House |
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| Maison Molon |
Works Cited
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