Richard Kauffmann (1887–1958) was a

German-Jewish The history of the Jews in Germany goes back at least to the year 321 CE, and continued through the Early Middle Ages (5th to 10th centuries CE) and High Middle Ages (c. 1000–1299 CE) when Jewish immigrants founded the Ashkenazi Jewish commu ...

architect who migrated to

Palestine Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...

in 1920. His architecture was influenced by

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ( ; ; born Maria Ludwig Michael Mies; March 27, 1886August 17, 1969) was a German-American architect, academic, and interior designer. He was commonly referred to as Mies, his surname. He is regarded as one of the pionee ...

, a proponent of the International Style, and was applied to the local landscape, laying the architectural groundwork for the nascent

State of Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

as well as that of several cities including

Hadar HaCarmel Hadar HaCarmel ( lit. "''Splendor of the Carmel''"; or simply known as the neighbourhood of Hadar , الهدار in Arabic language, Arabic) is a district of Haifa, Israel. Located on the northern slope of Mount Carmel between the upper and lower c ...

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

Nahalal Nahalal () is a moshav in Northern District (Israel), northern Israel. Covering , it falls under the jurisdiction of the Jezreel Valley Regional Council. In it had a population of . Nahalal is best known for its general layout, as designed by ...

Afula Afula () is a city in the Northern District of Israel, often known as the "Capital of the Valley" due to its strategic location in the Jezreel Valley. As of , the city had a population of . Afula's ancient tell (settlement mound) suggests habit ...

and the White City, as

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

International Style The International Style is a major architectural style and movement that began in western Europe in the 1920s and dominated modern architecture until the 1970s. It is defined by strict adherence to Functionalism (architecture), functional and Fo ...

architecture became known.

Biography

Early life, World War I, work in Europe

Richard Kauffmann was born in 1887 in

Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

, Germany. In 1907, he began to study art at the

Städelschule The Städelschule, full name Hochschule für Bildende Künste–Städelschule, is a tertiary school of art in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. It accepts about 20 students each year from around 500 applicants, and has a total of approximately 150 ...

, but transferred to architecture studies in Amsterdam the following year. In 1909, he moved to the

Technical University of Munich The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; ) is a public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences. Established in 1868 by King Ludwig II ...

, graduating in 1912. In 1914, he opened an office in Frankfurt. During the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

Kauffmann fought on the Eastern Front, where he became aware of the persecutions directed against East European Jews.Esther Kauffmann Forsen (ed.)
Richard Kauffmann – Architect and Town Planner: A daughter's perspective on his life and work
accessed 13 August 2018 In 1919, Kauffmann met

Arthur Ruppin Arthur Ruppin (; 1 March 1876 – 1 January 1943) was a German Zionist and one of the founders of the city of Tel Aviv.Todd Samuel Presner, ’German Jewish Studies in the Digital Age:Remarks on Discipline, Method nand Media,' in William Collin ...

, who invited him to design new Jewish settlements in Palestine as the leading physical planner of the Zionist enterprise. At that point, Kauffmann was already a government town planner in Christiania, now

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

, the capital of

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

Mandate Palestine

In 1920, he immigrated to

Eretz Yisrael The Land of Israel () is the traditional Jewish name for an area of the Southern Levant. Related biblical, religious and historical English terms include the Land of Canaan, the Promised Land, the Holy Land, and Palestine. The definitions ...

, at that point a British-controlled territory. Between 1920 and 1932, Kauffmann was the chief architect of the Palestine Land Development Company (''Hachsharat HaYishuv'') of the

Zionist movement Zionism is an ethnocultural nationalist movement that emerged in Europe in the late 19th century that aimed to establish and maintain a national home for the Jewish people, pursued through the colonization of Palestine, a region roughly co ...

. Kauffmann designed and initiated, almost alone, a full architectural master plan for the new rural villages of many kibutzim and

moshav A moshav (, plural ', "settlement, village") is a type of Israeli village or town or Jewish settlement, in particular a type of cooperative agricultural community of individual farms pioneered by the Labour Zionists between 1904 and 1 ...

im in the northern valleys (

Jezreel Valley The Jezreel Valley (from the ), or Marj Ibn Amir (), also known as the Valley of Megiddo, is a large fertile plain and inland valley in the Northern District (Israel), Northern District of Israel. It is bordered to the north by the highlands o ...

), most notably

Ein Harod Ein Harod () was a kibbutz in northern Israel near Mount Gilboa. Founded in 1921, it became the center of Mandatory Israel's kibbutz movement, hosting the headquarters of the largest kibbutz organisation, HaKibbutz HaMeuhad. In 1923 part of the ...

, Kfar Yehoshua,

Degania Alef Degania Alef (, ) is a kibbutz in northern Israel. The Jewish communal settlement ('' kvutza'') was founded in 1910, making it the earliest Labor Zionist farming commune in the Land of Israel. Its status as "the mother of all kibbutzim" is some ...

, Kfar Yehezkel and

Nahalal, the first '' moshav ovdim'', was designed in a circular shape, where public buildings were located in the middle surrounded by a circular road, then the agricultural farm buildings were about from each other, and then the farms and fields were wide and hundreds of meters long, forming a whole shape of sunshine rays. His designs for the children's house, kindergarten and school in Degania Alef embodied the social and educational principles of the

kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...

movement. Kauffmann was asked to design the northern neighborhoods of

, based on the urban plans of Patrick Geddes. In 1927, he was appointed a member of the British Mandate town planning committee. He built private residences all over the country and participated in design competitions. He was one of the architects of the Levant Fair (Hebrew ''Yarid HaMizrah'') in 1932–1934. He planned the layout of the pavilions. Kauffmann designed some new Israeli cities, such as

and

Herzliya Herzliya ( ; , / ) is an affluent List of Israeli cities, city in the Israeli coastal plain, central coast of Israel, at the northern part of the Tel Aviv District, known for its robust start-up and entrepreneurial culture. In it had a populatio ...

, and neighborhoods in major Israeli cities such as

Rehavia Rehavia or Rechavia (, ) is an upscale neighbourhood in Jerusalem. It is bordered by Nachlaot and Sha'arei Hesed to the north, Talbiya and Kiryat Shmuel, Jerusalem, Kiryat Shmuel to the south, and the Valley of the Cross to the west. Rehavia was ...

, Beit Hakerem, Talpiyot and Kiryat Moshe in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, and

, Neve Sha'anan, Bat Galim and Central Carmel in the city of

Concept and style

The main idea in his urban planning was the incorporation of Ebenezer Howard's idea of Garden suburbs, as a manifestation of social ideals, with the ideals of agricultural-Zionist communities, and with the pragmatical needs of the inhabitants of those communities and the settling organizations requests. He was influenced by Neoclassicist architecture, but his urban and agricultural community planning also addressed specific environmental and climate conditions.

References

External links