Willem Dudok
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Willem Marinus Dudok (6 July 1884 – 6 April 1974) was a famous Dutch modernist architect. He was born in
Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...
. He became City Architect for the town of
Hilversum Hilversum () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Holland, Netherlands. Located in the heart of the Gooi, it is ...
in 1928 where he was best known for the brick Hilversum Town Hall, completed in 1931. Not only did he design the building, but also the interior including the carpets, furniture and even the mayor's meeting hammer. He also designed and built about 75 houses, public buildings and entire
neighborhood A neighbourhood (Commonwealth English) or neighborhood (American English) is a geographically localized community within a larger town, city, suburb or rural area, sometimes consisting of a single street and the buildings lining it. Neigh ...
s.


Career

Dudok initially chose to pursue a military career. At the military academy of
Breda Breda ( , , , ) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the southern part of the Netherlands, located in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Brabant. ...
he studied civil engineering and was allowed to assist in designing military buildings. Influenced by other Dutch architects, such as Berlage, he rapidly proved able to adapt his own ideas. He was appointed Assistant Director of Public Works in
Leiden Leiden ( ; ; in English language, English and Archaism, archaic Dutch language, Dutch also Leyden) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Nethe ...
in 1913 and Director of Public Works in Hilversum in 1915. He was appointed Hilversum's Municipal Architect in 1928. The same year he was assigned the task of expanding the city, which involved designing housing estates, schools, swimming pools and parks and gardens. While his early style in Hilversum grew out of the
Amsterdam School The Amsterdam School (Dutch: ''Amsterdamse School'') is a style of architecture that arose from 1910 through about 1930 in the Netherlands. The Amsterdam School movement is part of international Expressionist architecture, sometimes linked ...
, the dramatic massing, asymmetry, the overhanging eaves and other elements of his landmark Hilversum City Hall were clearly influenced by
Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright Sr. (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed List of Frank Lloyd Wright works, more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key ...
and the Chicago
Prairie School Prairie School is a late 19th and early 20th-century architectural style, most common in the Midwestern United States. The style is usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped i ...
. The City Hall is regarded as his masterpiece and manages to merge the requirements of being both a symbol of the city and an efficient administrative building. It is indicative of the garden-city character of Hilversum. Indeed, Dudok was clearly influenced by Ebenezer Howard and
Raymond Unwin Sir Raymond Unwin (2 November 1863 – 29 June 1940) was a prominent and influential English engineer, architect and town planner, with an emphasis on improvements in working class housing. Early years Raymond Unwin was born in Rotherham, Yor ...
, pioneers of the garden-city movement in the United Kingdom. Dudok continued to produce progressive, Dutch modernist structures in Hilversum for decades, through the 1960s, and had international influence. Amongst school designers in the Netherlands, his schools in Hilversum became particularly celebrated. Dudok was also the architect of the branch of the De Bijenkorf department store in Rotterdam, a spectacular piece of commercial architecture clearly influenced by the
Bauhaus The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined Decorative arts, crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., ...
,
de Stijl De Stijl (, ; 'The Style') was a Dutch art movement founded in 1917 by a group of artists and architects based in Leiden (Theo van Doesburg, Jacobus Oud, J.J.P. Oud), Voorburg (Vilmos Huszár, Jan Wils) and Laren, North Holland, Laren (Piet Mo ...
, and the streamlining that was popular in both
Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...
and
Art Moderne Streamline Moderne is an international style of Art Deco architecture and design that emerged in the 1930s. Inspired by Aerodynamics, aerodynamic design, it emphasized curving forms, long horizontal lines, and sometimes nautical elements. In indu ...
modernist design of the 1920s and 1930s. When it opened in 1930, some 70,000 people attended the event. While it was partly destroyed in the
German bombing of Rotterdam In 1940, Rotterdam was subjected to heavy aerial bombardment by the ''Luftwaffe'' during the German invasion of the Netherlands during the Second World War. The objective was to support the German troops fighting in the city, break Dutch resi ...
in May 1940 during the
Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...
invasion of the Netherlands, numerous photographs, plans and other material documenting the structure's design and the structure have survived and recently aided in the production of a Dutch documentary on Dudok's department store. Dudok received the RIBA Gold Medal in 1935 and the
AIA Gold Medal The AIA Gold Medal is awarded by the American Institute of Architects conferred "by the national AIA Board of Directors in recognition of a significant body of work of lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture." It is the Ins ...
in 1955. He also designed the Collège néerlandais in the Cité Universitaire in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, a cultural centre in
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and a cinema in
Calcutta Kolkata, also known as Calcutta (List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern ba ...
. One of the buildings he designed in Rotterdam now houses a cafe-restaurant named after him. He drew up plans for the rebuilding of
The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...
after WW2. This involved a new district for 150,000 people in the southwest of the city. He died, aged 89, in Hilversum.


Works (selection)

*
City Hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...
, Hilversum, 1928–1931 * department store, Rotterdam, 1930 (destroyed during
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
) * Monument on
Afsluitdijk The Afsluitdijk (; ; "closure dyke") is a major dam and causeway in the Netherlands. It was constructed between 1927 and 1932 and runs from Den Oever in North Holland province to the village of Zurich, Friesland, Zurich in Friesland province, o ...
, The Netherlands, 1933 * Lighthouse Cinema, Kolkata, India, 1936 * Cité Universitaire, Collège néerlandais Paris, France, 1939 * ,
Utrecht Utrecht ( ; ; ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city of the Netherlands, as well as the capital and the most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of Utrecht (province), Utrecht. The ...
, 1941 * Exxon Gas stations, The Netherlands, 1953 File:HilversumCityHall-front.jpg, Hilversum City Hall, 1928–1931 File:HilversumDudokSchool-front.jpg, One of several Hilversum schools designed by Dudok File:Bijenkorf Rotterdam 1935.jpg, De Bijenkorf department store, Rotterdam, 1930 File:Abschlussdeich Aussichtsturm.jpg, Monument on
Afsluitdijk The Afsluitdijk (; ; "closure dyke") is a major dam and causeway in the Netherlands. It was constructed between 1927 and 1932 and runs from Den Oever in North Holland province to the village of Zurich, Friesland, Zurich in Friesland province, o ...
, 1933


References


External links


Website
with images and video of all the buildings in the world designed by Dudok. {{DEFAULTSORT:Dudok, Willem Marinus 1884 births 1974 deaths Architects from Amsterdam Dutch architects Hilversum Modernist architects Recipients of the Royal Gold Medal Recipients of the AIA Gold Medal