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Ornament and Materiality in the Work of Adolf Loos

BRIAN ANDREWS
University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Photographs dematerialize reality, but precisely

what I want is for people in my rooms to feel the
material around them. I want it to have its effect
on them I want them to be aware of the enclosing room, to feel the material, the wood, to see it,
touch it, to perceive it sensually, to sit comfortably
and feel the contact between the chair and a large
area of their peripheral sense of touch, and say: this
is sitting as it should be How can I demonstrate
on a photograph how good my chairs are to sit on?
How can I make a person who sees the photograph
feel it, however well the chair is photographed?
Adolf Loos, On Thrift (1924)

Ornament lends grace and beauty. Conversely, it

has been defined as an embellishing note not belonging to the essential harmony or melody. Herein
lies the dichotomy of ornament, comprehended as
a positive principle in one mien, but seen as near
superfluous in a divergent light.
Architecture has always revolved around the concept of ornament and architects have defined
themselves by their relationship to ornament. Architects have often been judged either by their skill
in employing ornament or in its denial. No discussion of Ornament is complete without the mention
of Adolf Loos, the Viennese Modernist, whose 1910
seminal essay, Ornament and Crime, was responsible for the abolition of much of what one might
term traditional ornament in Modern Architecture.
Ornament is no longer recognized as a fundamental element of architecture, the misreading of the
Functionalist Doctrine has destroyed it.
Ornament still exists in modern architecture; it
has been disguised under different principles.
The Modern Architect, raped of figurative and

Adolf Loos

representational ornament, either by choice or

necessity, began to exploit other means of ornament to separate themselves from the engineers.
Materiality has perhaps been the most powerful
of these principles. Adolf Loos, by his own hand

ORNAMENT AND MATERIALITY IN THE WORK OF ADOLF LOOS

439

found himself denied the use of any ornament

that was not culturally derived. How was he, as
an architect, going to manage this loss of what
some might term the very essence of architecture? Loos used many principles to offset this loss
of traditional representational ornament. Materiality was however the strongest and most powerful. Loos utilized his skill and love of materials
in a manner that transcended the mere act of
application and instead wove together architecture
and culture.
This paper will examine a number of rooms or
works by Loos, thereby examining and explaining
how Loos, through Materiality, was able to use ornament in a new and original way. Some of the
works will include the Karntner Bar, his wifes bedroom, the bathroom of the Villa Karma, the elevation of the Looshaus, the music room of the Villa
Moller and the boudoir of the Villa Muller. Within
these, Loos, denied of traditional ornament, was
able to use the cultural and physical properties of
material as a way continuing the tradition or ornament in architecture.
For example, the elevation of the Karntner Bar in
Vienna is comprised of three different elements; a
sign that reads American Bar, a glass prism that
represents a stylized American Flag with the inscription Karntner Bar and finally four pilasters of
reddish Skyros marble. The marble of these pilasters is colored in such a way that they seem to naturally have a gray base and a red shaft enabling
a subtle reference to the traditional architectural
orders. The veins in the marble are intricate and
seem to float within the material itself, giving them
a three dimensional quality.
The dichotomy of Adolf Loos can be detected fairly
early in his life. Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos
was born on December 10, 1870 in Brunn. This
city at the time was the industrial and commercial
center of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
His father, who was a sculptor and stonemason, is
often credited with providing Adolf his love of beautiful materials and meticulous details. However,
since his father died when he was only nine years
old, we must assume that Looss use of precious
materials was perhaps more of a remembrance.
Looss early education was fraught with difficulties.
It began in 1884 when he entered the Obergym-

The Karntner Bar

nasium of the Benedictines of Melk; he left after

only one semester and then entered the National
School of Arts and Crafts in Reichenburg, in the
hopes of becoming a mechanic. Finally he found
himself at the National School of Arts and Crafts in
Brunn where he studied mechanical construction.
In 1889 he turned to architecture and enrolled in
the technical university in Dresden. During the
next year Loos began a career in the military reserve. Within a year he had completed his training
and was an Officer of the Reserve. Not long after
this Loos had a uniform tailor made and had himself photographed while wearing it. In 1892 Loos
returned to Dresden to finish his studies. During
these years in Dresden, Loos joined not only a student fraternity, but also a dueling club. These actions speak of someone, who as a member of a
bourgeoisie society, is searching for the recognition
of his personal honor. (1) Through these endeavors, Loos was seemingly able to achieve a level of
prestige and it helps to explain his life long fascination with manners, etiquette and uniforms.
I have discovered the following truth and present
it to the world: cultural evolution is equivalent to
the removal of ornament from articles in daily use.
Adolf Loos

This desire to attain entrance into a noble society

seems counter intuitive to Looss later position as
a leader of Europes avant garde and modernist
movements. Herein lies the duality of Loos as a
man, a philosopher and an architect. On one level
he is seen, where so many prefer to place him, as
a modernist. On another level he is recognized as

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a traditionalist that understood the value of history

and the past. One question that has accompanied
this realization deals with one of his favorite subjects, ornament. It is difficult to separate ornament
from the architecture of the past, in particular classical architecture. Loos always professed on some
levels to be a classicist. Yet Looss seminal essay
Ornament and Crime seems to condemn ornament as an architectural practice. Loos condemned
not all ornament, only that which was not culturally derived. Undoubtedly, Loos felt that classical
ornament, used properly, was allowable. This is
evidenced by his numerous uses of classical architecture in projects such as the Looshaus and the
Villa Karma. Loos faced a dilemma, how was he to
articulate an argument against the new superfluous ornament of the Seccession and Art Nouveau,
while maintaining the grammar of the classical?
The essay was published in Paris in 1913, and was
received as a purist manifesto; it became Ornament is Crime. The misreading of this essay has
caused irreparable damage to architecture. Loos
in 1924, wrote in Ornament and Education: I affirmed twenty-six years ago that the evolution of
humanity would cause ornament to disappear from
functional objects, an evolution which would allow
its ineluctable and logical pathBut I never thought
like the purists who pushed this reasoning to the
absurd, that ornament should be systematically
abolished. It is only where the passage of time
makes it disappear that it cannot be reborn.(2)

seen in his geometric and stripped down domestic

exteriors. In Looss domestic interiors, the expression was eclectic, reflecting a fundamental split in
his work between a comfortable rusticity on the one
hand and a severe monumentality on the other. (3)
The interiors of Looss architecture are remarkably
different from the exterior on certain levels, most
notably, the materials. The geometry of these interiors is often very simple, taking it cues from the
more ascetic exterior. The interiors difference is
illustrated in its celebrated and sensual use of materials. Loos was operating in turn of the century
Vienna, a most vibrant place intellectually, socially
and artistically. Loos used Freuds idea of masking
in his domestic architecture. Freud spoke about
how each person wears a mask, in other words,
one cannot tell what another person is thinking by
looking at their face. Loos manifested this idea
in his houses. Looss interiors were conceived as
a place of retreat from the shocking alterations in
the public realm. (4) The street or public elevations
were often stripped of all ornament and were in
effect dumb.

This conflict in architecture, between ornament

and modernism, paralleled Looss personal struggle
between a member of Europes avant-garde and
his desire to be accepted into noble society. Ultimately Loos was able to achieve an architecture
that defied many of the consequences that other
architects were unable to avoid. Loos was not dogmatic when it came to his designs. Like all good
architects, he had principles, however these principles allowed him to maneuver through the field
with a different mind-set than most modern architects. His principles did not produce a unified language per se, but instead prevented a formulaic
approach. In short one might say that he invented
a formula that did not allow a formula. This approach was very different from his contemporaries.
Looss theories dictated all manner of concerns in
ones life, from manners, etiquette, dress, and art
and of course architecture. Loos was opposed to
styles, or even the notion of style, this is easily

These sentiments directed Loos throughout his career. His facades were simple in that they needed
to respond to everyone. They masked the interiors, which were where the true nature of the individual could emerge. There is a marked difference
between Looss interiors and his exteriors, however
the theories that produced them is consistent and
as valid today as in fin de sicle Vienna. These
interiors emerge from two different sources, one
is the idea of the raumplan, and the other is the
concreteness of materials. In this paper I shall primarily discuss the materials and how they acted
as a replacement for ornament. Using a palette
of materials, I shall discuss a number of Looss
projects and attempt to explain how he was using
these materials and how they satisfied his need for
ornament.

The work of art is brought into the world without there

being a need for it. The house satisfies a requirement.
The work of art is responsible to none; the house is responsible to everyone. The work of art wants to draw
people out of their state of comfort.
Adolf Loos, Architektur (1910)

One should remember that quality materials and

good workmanship do not simply make up for a
lack of ornamentation; they far surpass it in luxu-

ORNAMENT AND MATERIALITY IN THE WORK OF ADOLF LOOS

riousness. More than that, they make ornamentation redundant. Nowadays, even the most vulgar
person would hesitate to decorate a fine wood with
inlay work, engrave over the natural patterns of
a marble slab, or cut a magnificent silver fox into
small squares to make a chessboard design with
other fursFine material is Gods own wonder.
Adolf Loos, Hands Off, 1917

MARBLE
It is to Looss credit that he thinks of marble not
merely in terms of its material reality but in what
Demetri Porphyrios has called the stylistic density that is the coded meanings that classicism
has already assigned to it. Loos seemed to understand that when he said, not just the material, but
the forms as well are bound up with place, with the
nature of the earth and the air. (5)

detail or ornamentation. Yet Loos had to essentially

pick them from a quarry. This decision is of course
tantamount to designing them. He did not choose
a white Carrara marble that would have minimum
veining, but instead chose the reddish gray Skyros.
The veins and imperfections of the marble imply
a type of authorless ornamentation. These veins
are of course natural to the material, but they still
operate on ones senses in the same way that an
ornamented pillar might. In other words, the eye
is drawn to their graphic quality, just as it might be
to one of Wagners invented forms. One almost expects to feel a texture when touching them. Inside
the Bar Loos uses dark green marble (tinos green)
pilasters and beams as a way to demarcate the
space into three equal bays. The ceiling is coffered
using a white marble that has darker veins (rosso
antico). There are four coffers in each of the three
bays resulting in a 3x4 composition that has seemingly no relationship to the plan of the furniture of
the bar. It is as if this cave of marble somehow
existed previously and Loos was merely furnishing
it. This marble and its lack of relationship to the
furniture serve as a way of identifying it as being

Krntner Bar

Of all the materials that Loos utilized in his projects, marble is perhaps the one that he is most
closely associated with. This material found its
way into many of Looss projects and was continually handled with a skill unknown to his modern
counterparts. In this paper I shall discuss only a
few of these projects. The first project where the
use of marble is most arresting is the Krntner Bar.
The exterior pillars of the Bar, which are in fact not
structural, are clad in Skyros marble. This marble
is colored in such a way that they naturally have a
gray base and a red shaft, this acts as a subtle reference to the classical order of a column. In reality
these pillars are very simple in form and have no

441

Interior of Karntner Bar

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from another time. The marble represents a noble

culture, meanings that classicism had already imbibed it with. It should also be mentioned that the
wall facing the street on the interior is constructed
of onyx marble. As the light from the street filters
through this material it is transformed into the color of whiskey, thereby referencing the very goods
that are sold and consumed in the space.
The Looshaus on the Michaelerplatz was another
project where Loos used marble in an ornamental
fashion. He used Skyros marble in the interiors in
the same way that he used it on the exterior pillars
of the Karntner Bar; as a graphic device. On the
base of the exterior faade, Loos employed Cipollino marble in a different manner and as a direct
reference to Rome. The Romans had made extensive use of this marble and Loos attempted to draw
a connection to the Romans by using this marble
and also by using classical forms. Since Loos rejected the ornament of the 19th century that was so
prevalent in Vienna, he was again facing a design
dilemma; how was he going to dress the bottom of
this building in a way that worked with its consumer
function. Loos, having spent time in Chicago, was
very aware of the ornamentation that Sullivan had
used as an attention getting device in the Carson
Piere Scott building. He realized that something

similar would be required in the Looshaus. Loos

chose a marble that on one hand was as graphic
as Sullivans ornament, and on another connected
the building directly to Rome and Roman Culture.
Essentially, by embracing historical forms and materials, Loos was able to leap over the problems of
new invented ornament.
Other buildings where Loos employed marble as a
type of ornamentation were the Villa Karma, the
Duschnitz Villa, the Strasser Villa and the Villa
Muller. It should also be noted that Loos typically
used marble as a cladding and not as a structural
material.

Library of Villa Moller

WOOD
Looss use of wood was truly ubiquitous in that it
is difficult to name a project where it was not utilized. He used wood primarily as a cladding for the
interior walls of his domestic interiors. This interior
cladding and much of Looss interior syntax was
taken from Muthesiuss three-volume study Das
Englische Haus of 1904. (6) These woods usually
took the form of a wainscot, but sometimes incorporated the entire wall, such as the music room
in the Villa Moller. Almost without exception Loos
used dark oak wood in the public interiors of his
domestic projects. In the commercial projects he
typically engaged a finer wood such as cherry or
Looshaus on the Michaelplatz

ORNAMENT AND MATERIALITY IN THE WORK OF ADOLF LOOS

443

mahogany. As with marble, Loos was using this

material not only because he felt that it was perhaps beautiful, but also because it was imbibed
with meaning. As an Anglophile, Loos was fascinated with English culture and it is not surprising
that his interiors borrow so much from the English
Arts and Crafts tradition. Wood was also typically
used in the beams of the public rooms, although,
like the marble that he so often used, these beams
were in fact rarely structural and were instead used
in a symbolic way rather than a strictly functional
way. Loos relied on wood to give his interiors a
warm and welcoming feel, something that he felt
very strongly about. This leads to the moods
which architecture, according to Loos, has to be
capable of calling up in individuals as in the law
courts which have to appear like a threatening
gesture towards secret vice, the bank, which has
to say to the individual that here your money is securely and kept by honest people. It is crucial that
under these circumstances Loos neither demanded
nor offered inventions for the symbolization of
these functions, but called for the architect to establish relations with these buildings, which have
hitherto produced this mood. (7) Loos accumulated
a pool of materials, elements and surfaces that he
was able to tap into repeatedly, and that could be
arranged in order to match the desired character of
his houses with the personalities of his clients and
their families. (8)

lada Muller. It is telling that these most exquisite

materials are used in the heart of the house, the
private space for the woman. The spatial development of the boudoir is in many ways of the villa
itself. Each volumetric unit within the room (like
each room with in the villa) is charged with a discernable interiority. The Villa Muller was the last of
Looss garden villas and this room, which is often
described as a jewel box, perhaps more than any
other, typifies his ideas of space and materiality.

In this consideration of wood as a material, one

special moment in Looss architecture worth consideration is the ladys room (Damenzimmer) at
the Villa Muller. This room is special in that upon
entering the Villa, one is naturally lead through a
series of episodes to this particular space. This
entry sequence is essentially a spiral that leads to
this small but rich room. Spatially the room is divided in a typical raumplan system, with a seating
area above and a space for a daybed below. The
seating area has a view down to the living room
and out of the window beyond to the city of Prague,
which confirms reciprocity between the city and the
house. This room is faced in a light lemon wood
that like many of the marbles chosen by Loos has
a natural graphic quality that essentially makes the
ornament. Loos often used lighter woods for the
most private parts of a house and darker woods for
the public or more masculine areas. The centrality and voyeuristic power of this room is perhaps
explained by rumors of Looss relationship with Mi-

TEXTILES

Boudoir of Villa Muller

When considers textiles in Looss work, then typically one thinks of either the fabric of his built in
furniture or perhaps the numerous Persian carpets that are seen in the interior photos. Loos felt
strongly that items such as carpets should chosen
not by the architect, but by the clients. To Loos, the
interior furnishings were of little concern to the architect. Clients had favorite chairs, carpets passed
down from generations, all these must be accommodated in any house. The fabrics that Loos used
in his built in furniture were often floral patterns
typical of the English arts and crafts movement.
In the Karntner Bar he imagined using green automobile leather for the seating. Loos also used
curtains to divide rooms as in his own apartment
and the main room of the Steiner House to name
a few. The most singular use of textile in Looss
work came actually in one of his earliest works,
the bedroom for his wife Lina. The parquet floor of

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this room was covered with a pale blue wall-to-wall

carpet, above which a large Angora rabbit fur rug
lies. This rug occupied most of the floor and continued up over the bed. Loos saw fur as the original
textile; it was the first fabric that man used. The
walls were completely covered to the door height
by white curtains in Batist rayee. There were soft
wood cabinets that were hidden behind these curtains. This bedroom, which Loos used until the end
of his life, was the ultimate intimate space and was
so direct and immediate in addressing an archaic
drive and instinctive needs.

qualities. Loos first used mirrors in the Hirsch and

Schwarzwald apartments where large plate-glass
mirrors combined with freestanding pillars creates
a perceptual oscillation between the virtual and
real mirror image of the space. (9) Loos typically
used the mirror as a method of extending space.
This is most clearly seen in the Karntner Bar in Vienna, where the illusionistic clerestory helps to expand the upper volume of the space. When sitting
in the Bar however, it is easy to image that there
are other Bars next door and you wonder exactly
what is happening in them. This explosion of space
above eye level serves this small interior well.

Lina Looss Bedroom

That is the correct way; the logical way architects

should go about their business. That was the order
in which mankind learned to build. In the beginning
we sought to clad ourselves, to protect ourselves
from the elements, to keep ourselves safe and
warm while sleeping. We sought to cover ourselves.
Originally consisting of animal furs or textiles,
this covering is the earliest architectural feature.
Adolf Loos, The Principle of Cladding, 1898

The materials of this room are archaic and their

meanings supply the ornament. It is an intellectual/material ornament rather than a graphic/material ornament.
MIRRORS
The last material that I shall discuss is really a type
of anti-material or non-material. Loos was the first
modern architect to use the mirror extensively. He
was fascinated by its ability to extend and multiply
space and was equally captivated by its voyeuristic

Mirrors of the Karntner Bar

With pleasure, the eye meets the soft mahogany

shine of the panels, which extend beyond half of
the rooms height, sliding and sinking, surprised by
newness at every turn, in the interweaving of reality and pure reflection of the solidly formed yet
unladen marble coffers of the ceiling and of the wall
made of translucent onyx slabs. (10)
Loos also used the mirror in the Looshaus on the
Michaelerplatz, where two mirrors located opposite
each other in the entry foyer, reflect the occupant
into infinity. Loos used mirrors on the main landing of the stairway that was located in the Goldman
and Salatsch shop. These mirrors, like those in
the Karntner Bar explode the space above the mahogany panels and reflect the glass block ceiling.

ORNAMENT AND MATERIALITY IN THE WORK OF ADOLF LOOS

445

during his lifetime. Having little or no control of

structural or real spatial issues, Loos instead articulated these interiors with what he termed permanent wall paper. Each room is clad in the appropriate
material; each creates a mood that comes not only
from the material and its ornament, but also from
its history. As people dress for certain occasions, so
were Looss rooms dressed in their clothing. Dining
rooms and living rooms were either in dark oak or
marble, bedrooms were typically light woods with
fabric, shops were fitted with fine woods and brass
metal work, commercial facades were clad in exquisite marble or granite and the exterior of houses
were almost always left dumb. Loos understood
and used ornament through his architecture, it was
not however, the ornament of the Secessionists or
the Art Nouveau, it was an ornament based in history and in the materials themselves.
The essential happens regardless.
Friedrich Nietzsche

ENDNOTES

Mirror on landing of the Knize Shop

Loos employed the mirror in the Knize shop in a different manner. This refined interior of cherry wood
and brass details contains numerous mirrors that
are often difficult to discern. Here the mirror acts
not only in a reflective and spatial manner, but also
as voyeuristic or security device. There is a mirror
placed strategically on the landing of the customers stair that allows the store manager to see who
is entering the shop from his office on the second
floor. Beyond the spatial and voyeuristic qualities
of the mirrors, they worked well in this space in
that they also allowed the customers to continually
see themselves in their new finery.
CONCLUSION
Loos used all these materials as a way of cladding.
Loos would have encountered the teachings of
Semper in Dresden and although Semper thought
primarily of textiles in teachings on cladding, Loos
incorporated all manner of materials into this practice. This undoubtedly came about due to the fact
that Loos executed some 56 apartment interiors

1. Janet Stewart, Fashioning Vienna, Adolf Looss

Cultural Criticism, p. 4
2. Adolf Loos, Ornement e education (1924) in
Malgre tout, p. 289
3. Kenneth Frampton, Introduction, Adolf Loos and the
Crisis of Culture, 1896-1931, p. 11. In the book The
Architecture of Adolf Loos.
4. Gevork Hartoonian, Ontology of Construction,
Chap. 3, p. 44
5. Gevork Hartoonian, Ontology of Construction,
Chap. 3, p. 46
6. Kenneth Frampton, Adolf Loos: The Architect as
Master Builder, p.17. in the book by Roberto Schezen,
Adolf Loos, Architecture 1903-1932
7. Dietmar Steiner, The Strength of the Old Masters:
Adolf Loos and Antiquity, p.23. In the book The
Architecture of Adolf Loos.
8. Ralf Bock, Adolf Loos, Works and Projects, p.80
9. Kenneth Frampton, Adolf Loos: The Architect as
Master Builder, p.18. in the book by Roberto Schezen,
Adolf Loos, Architecture 1903-1932
10. Munz, Kunstler, Der Architekt Adolf Loos, p.40