hungary - turn of the century architecture Ödön Lechner: Museum of decorative arts

This museum (1891-1896) is a picturesque building with the high,

tent-like roof out of coloured, emailed tiles. Akos Moravansky writes

that the oriental art was not totally foreign to the Danube monarchy,

since the walls of the Majolica house of Otto Wagner have the same

carpet-like decoration, even if the transfer was maybe made possible

through the study of Mediteranean cultures (the Doge palace in Venice

is decorated similarly). The forms language at Lechner is not unitary:

the interior of the hall has indian, venetian and French renaissance

reminiscences. But the cornerstones of the characteristics of

Lechner's style are given: the composition with a middle resalit, the

polychrome threatment of the wall and especially of the roof surfaces,

the total dissolution of the classical cornice. Akos Moravanszky notes

that in the ground floor solution Lechner remains conservative. What

makes the space complex an experience place it the richness in

decoration and the connections and views through the spaces.