Fagus Factory

Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer – realization in 1911-1925

Officine Fagus are a shoe mold factory designed by Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer and built in 1911. The workshops stood isolated on the outskirts of the town of Alfeld an der Leine in a valley between woods and hills; they have remained practically intact, as well as the city, as it is one of the few areas spared since the Second World War.
In the Fagus factory there are several formal innovations: with glass and steel felt as "without essence" Gropius gave the building a compact and at the same time transparent body. For the first time, glass curtain walls were applied to a multi-storey brick building. The corners without supports of the transparent coating of the building, which allow to see the landings suspended in the air inside, contradicted the traditional concepts of stability.