Le Corbusier

Hardcover, 21 x 26 cm, 0.56 kg, 96 pages

ISBN 978-3-8365-6032-0
Edition: German

ISBN 978-3-8365-6035-1
Edition: English

Modern living

Le Corbusier: Master builder of the future

Born Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, Le Corbusier (1887–1965) is widely regarded as the most influential architect of the 20th century. Whether private villa or social housing: With his radical ideas, designs and writings, he was not concerned with renewing individual structures, but with reinventing the entire concept of modern living.

Le Corbusier's building projects have evolved over the years from early houses in the traditional Swiss style to gleaming white purist villas to dynamic syntheses of art and architecture such as those found in the Ronchamp Chapel and the administrative buildings in Chandigarh, India. The ability to combine functionalist approaches with a strong expressionism runs through his entire work. The social aspect of urban planning was also important to Le Corbusier - he was a founding member of the Congrès international d'architecture modern (CIAM), which defined "architecture as social art".

Presenting some of Le Corbusier's most iconic projects, this volume introduces a modernist architect, thinker and pioneer who, even through his unrealized designs, will continue to inspire generations to come.

The author

In 1997, Jean-Louis Cohen was commissioned by the French Minister of Education to design the Cité de l'architecture, an ambitious architecture museum, in a wing of the Palais de Chaillot in Paris. His research covers architecture and urban planning in the 20th century. Cohen studied architecture with a focus on Germany and the Soviet era, dealt intensively with the work of Le Corbusier and the history of Parisian urban planning. He is the author of numerous books on the subject of architecture and curator of exhibitions on the subject.

The Publisher

Peter Gössel runs an agency for museum and exhibition design. For TASCHEN, he has edited monographs on Julius Shulman, RM Schindler, John Lautner, and Richard Neutra, as well as several architecture titles in the Small Series.