Windows of the Avantgarde (begin 20th century) in Vienna (above: House at Michaelis Platz, architect A. Loos, photo in April 2005) and Budapest (bellow: House Rózsavölgyi, architect B. Lajta, photo in September 2003)

Hello Maria.

This is an interesting architectural comparrison.

One often forgets that Austria and Hungary share a joint herritage - Wars against the Turks made Hungary Ottoman, and enriched Budapest in an eastern manner which never touched Vienna. The division continued when Hitler came - Austria embraced the new order, but Hungary was never comfortable, and eventually fought back in the last stages of the war. Then the iron curtain came down, and the cities seemed cut off from one anither for ever. Different ideologies continued to steer these two cities in seemingly opposit directions, but hundreds of years couldn't detroy the paring of these two great bastiens of central europe, and now as the Danube flows ever onward, the wounds appear to be healing themselves once more!

Fond regards, Nick.

Hi again,

history was a discipline I hated in school, so cannot say much about that. I have been more interested in 'applied history', like art history and such.

Well, the buildings are from early 20th century, between 1900 and WWI.

Making this kind of comparisons is really very easy for me, much more easy than making an original photograph. I agree, now reading what you wrote, that I cannot recall having seen somewhere specifically the windows of Loos and of Lajta, although I read a lot comparative architecture studies about that time (it is my continuous research interest since more than 10 years, ie from my student works back in Romania on).

If you like this kind of comparison, I can post more compositions - the one occuring to mind now I recall at least that I read the description of. The photos are not great, and additionally they present a further similarity, not related to architectural detail: both buildings are in renovation at the moment the photo was taken (ie building site ...).

More stunning are the urbanistic similarities between London and Budapest, though, I think [maybe I shall not wait that long for the next photo CD, I'll see how many photos came together], at least apparently. When I have time I will read if there were major events in Budapest to baroque times, like the great fire and Wren's plan for London.

regards to London!

Maria

hi Nick,

I don't have the other Budapest-Vienna buildings comparison (that one I've put in a scientific paper), but a Bucharest-Vienna one. That is definitely more strange, as at least Budapest and Vienna both belonged to the Donaumonarchie, but Bucharest is a completely different story.

You can see it here.

Enjoy!

Maria

see the title for more details

thanks

Maria