Karl Moser

Karl Moser
Moser, c. 1915
Born	Karl Coelestin Moser (1860-08-10)10 August 1860 Baden, Switzerland
Died	28 February 1936(1936-02-28) (aged 75) Zurich, Switzerland
Occupation	Architect
Spouse	Euphemie Lorenz
Children	5, including Werner M. Moser

The Moser family grave at Fluntern Cemetery in Zurich

Karl Coelestin Moser (10 August 1860 – 28 February 1936) was a Swiss architect who became known in Switzerland as the "father of modern architecture". He co-founded Curjel & Moser and later taught architecture at ETH Zurich. His works included the modernist St. Anton Church in Basel. From 1928 to 1930, he was the inaugural president of the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne.

Biography

Karl Coelestin Moser was born in Baden, Switzerland, on 10 August 1860. His father, Robert Moser, was an architect. He studied architecture at the Zurich Polytechnic from 1878 to 1882 under Alfred Friedrich Bluntschli. After graduating, he briefly worked in Bluntschli’s architectural practice. He continued his studies at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris with Jean-Louis Pascal and also worked in the office of Jules-Aubert-Clément Reboul.

While working in Wiesbaden, Moser met Robert Curjel. He travelled to Italy in 1887. In the same year, he married Euphemie Lorenz. They had five children, including the architect Werner M. Moser. Moser and Curjel founded Curjel & Moser in Karlsruhe in 1888.

Moser declined an appointment at ETH Zurich in 1899. From 1907 to 1912, he worked for the Baden state railways as an architectural adviser. The University of Zurich awarded Moser an honorary doctorate in 1914. In 1915, he left the partnership and became a professor of architecture at ETH Zurich, where he taught until 1928. He also established an architectural practice in Zurich, which he maintained until 1936.

Moser served as the first president of the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne from 1928 to 1930. He died in Zurich on 28 February 1936.

Architecture

Curjel & Moser

Within Curjel & Moser, Karl Moser generally directed the firm’s Swiss projects, while Robert Curjel concentrated more heavily on residential and commercial work in Karlsruhe. Moser also took the leading role in the firm’s architectural design. Curjel & Moser became one of Baden’s foremost architectural practices and completed both public and private commissions. Its work included churches, schools, houses, commercial buildings and industrial projects.

Moser often involved artists in his architectural projects, including Max Laeuger and Oskar Kiefer. During a journey to England with Laeuger in 1896, he encountered the Arts and Crafts movement and the work of the American architect Henry Hobson Richardson.

Among the firm's principal works were the Kunsthaus Zürich, the University of Zurich’s main building and Basel Badischer Bahnhof. The design of the Kunsthaus treated its artworks and architectural setting as parts of a unified composition. Moser later developed two proposals to expand the museum. A rear addition incorporating a reading room was completed, while a later proposal from the 1930s remained unrealised.

Independent work and modernism

Moser’s architecture changed substantially over the course of his career. His earlier work drew on historical styles, while designs produced around 1910 adopted a more restrained classical character. In the 1920s, he embraced modern architecture. His interest in recent Dutch architecture and his contact with a younger generation of architects at ETH Zurich contributed to this development.

St. Anton Church in Basel was among the principal works of his independent career. It was Switzerland’s first church built with exposed concrete. Completed in 1927, it is regarded as an architectural monument of international importance. Its exposed concrete attracted both admiration and criticism when the church opened.

Beyond St. Anton Church, his Zurich practice designed housing estates with social facilities for Swiss industrial companies, as well as commercial buildings in Baden and Schaffhausen.

Moser’s 1933 plan for Zurich’s Niederdorf quarter called for demolishing much of the historic neighbourhood and replacing it with rows of modern housing, while preserving only a few monuments. The plan drew on ideas associated with Le Corbusier’s Plan Voisin and reflected the increasingly radical character of Moser’s approach to modern urban planning.

Legacy

Moser was a leading Swiss architect around the turn of the twentieth century and played an important role in the development of modern architecture in Switzerland. During his lifetime, Le Corbusier reportedly called him the "father of modernism". By the 1920s, Moser was widely known in Switzerland as the "father of modern architecture".

Moser remained receptive to new architectural ideas throughout his career and brought the same openness to his teaching. At ETH Zurich, he reorganised the architectural curriculum and gave construction teaching a more prominent place. He became a mentor to younger architects. His relationship with students was informal and collaborative. Several of those he taught later became prominent figures in Switzerland’s New Building movement. His reforms to architectural education and sustained support for younger designers contributed to the international recognition of modern Swiss architecture.

Gallery

• 
  Pauluskirche in Basel (1899–1901), designed by Curjel & Moser
• 
  Kunsthaus Zürich (1904–1910), designed by Curjel & Moser
• 
  St. Anton Church in Basel (completed 1927), designed by Moser in the modernist style
• 
  Interior of St. Anton Church in Basel

Further reading

• Leonardo Benevolo. History of Modern Architecture, Volume 2. MIT Press, 1977 pg. 618