Herbert Hirche

Herbert Hirche ( born May 20, 1910 in Görlitz, † January 28, 2002 in Heidelberg ) was a German architect and furniture and product designer.

Life

After a carpentry apprenticeship and travels in the years 1924 to 1929 Herbert Hirche studied from 1930 to 1933 at the Bauhaus in Dessau and Berlin. His teachers included, among other things, Wassily Kandinsky and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, in which he held until 1938 in his office in Berlin worked as a staff of 1934.

From 1939 to 1945 Hirche worked for Egon Eiermann, 1945 for Hans Scharoun. From 1945 to 1948 he was the main speaker at the Planning Office for the reconstruction of the city of Berlin. In 1948 he was appointed Professor of Applied Arts at the University of Applied Arts in Berlin-Weissensee, which he announced in 1950 because of the " formalism debate ' the construction of the Stalin Allee. Hirche was since 1950 a member of the Deutscher Werkbund and since 1959 of the Association of German industrial designer, which he was president from 1960 to 1970. 1951 to 1952 he designed to work with the building department Mannheim the establishment of a School of Design; he also prepared the competition for the National Theatre Mannheim, on his initiative and his teacher Ludwig Mies van der Rohe took part in the. 1952 to 1975 he was professor of interior architecture and furniture design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart. Two years, 1969 to 1971, he was its rector. He also belonged to the German Design Council in 1961. 1977 awarded him the Academy Honorary Membership. In his speech referred to him by the then Rector, Wolfgang Kermer, as a " last Bauhäusler from Weißenhof ".

Work

He was always active as a freelance architect, designer and exhibition designer. Herbert Hirche had great influence on the development of product and interior design in Germany after the Second World War, where he earned the ideas and style of the Bauhaus teaching. He designed furniture and sophisticated industrial products.

"If something is self-evident and beautiful, then it is a good design. "

When the company Braun began to position themselves as a design- oriented company, they commissioned alongside Hans Gugelot Herbert Hirche. The developed design attitude was later continued by Dieter Rams. Music Cabinets von Braun, designed by Herbert Hirche, were in the late 1950s in every modern villa, many architects recommended such devices to equip their buildings.

Hirche's work was also shown at national and international fairs and exhibitions. These include the Milan Triennale in 1957 and the World Exhibition in Brussels in 1958. In 1964, examples of his work at the documenta III in Kassel in the Department of Industrial Design were shown.

Both its architecture, and the he designed furniture and industrial products were characterized by functionality and harmonious proportions on the basis of generally cubical basic forms. He developed collapsible home furniture and office furniture systems that could be mounted by the buyers themselves.

Literature and sources

• State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart: the 200th anniversary of the Academy: Teachers from 1946 to 1961. Stuttgart State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart, 1961, pp. 78-81
• Documenta III. International Exhibition; Catalogue: Volume 1: Paintings and Sculpture; Volume 2: Hand drawings; Volume 3: Industrial design, graphic; Kassel / Cologne 1964
• Herbert hirche. architecture interior design 1945-1978, Stuttgart 1978 - Catalogue for the exhibitions at Landesgewerbeamt Stuttgart 16 February - 22 July, 1978 - March 30, 1978, bauhaus archive berlin 13 April to 14 May 1978 House Industrieform Food June 23 Institute for new technical form Darmstadt 20 October to 26 November 1978
• Kasiske, Michael: Bright gray. Herbert Hirche retrospective at Werkbundarchiv. In: Bauwelt, Issue 28.10, 101 born 23 July 2010, p 5
• Kermer, Wolfgang: Birthdays [ 65th birthday of Herbert Hirche on May 20, 1975 ]. In: . Academy releases 7 / State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart / For the period from April 1, 1975 to May 31, 1976 Stuttgart State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart, August 1976, p 38
• Kermer, Wolfgang: Human Design as a life's work: the architect and designer Herbert Hirche 's 75th birthday. In: Stuttgarter Nachrichten, No. 115, May 20, 1985
• Kimpel, Harald / stem, Karin: documenta III 1964 - International Exhibition - A photographic reconstruction ( Series of the documenta - Archives), Bremen 2005, ISBN 978-3-86108-528-7
• Marquart, Christian: industrial culture - industrial design. A piece of German economic and design history. The founders of the Association of German industrial designer, Berlin [about 1993 ], page 105-135.
• Niedenthal, Clemens: No pandering to the consumer, in: the daily newspaper, No. 9252, July 30, 2010, p 28
• Rezepa - Zabel, Heide: Herbert Hirche. In: Collector's Journal. Art, Antiques, Auctions, Issue 8/ 2010, pp. 32-39