Form Follows Function
Louis Sullivan, “The Tall Office Building Artistically Considered” (1896)
In 1896 the American architect Louis Sullivan wrote that form ever follows function. He was thinking about the new tall office buildings of Chicago: their shape should grow from what they are for, not from borrowed ornament.
Ask what a thing is for before deciding what it should look like.
In 1919 Walter Gropius founded the Bauhaus school in Weimar, Germany. It brought artists and craftspeople together and taught that well-made everyday objects, from chairs to lamps, could be both useful and beautiful. The school was closed in 1933.
Good design is not decoration added at the end; it is the thinking behind the object.
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