The volume discusses the project of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) for the house of his sister Margaret on Kundmanngasse in Vienna (1926-1928). A surprising document for an understanding the work of Wittgenstein and certain less familiar aspects of contemporary architectural research.
[Ludwig Wittgenstein. Architect] In 1926-28 Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) worked on the design of a house for his sister Margaret on Kundmanngasse in Vienna. Until 1951, the year of the philosopher’s death, the construction, completed in the years before Wittgenstein moved to Cambridge, was overlooked. In the following decades the house became the focus of research and differing interpretations, part of the flourishing studies on 20th-century culture and architecture. The villa was created with the help of the architect Paul Engelmann, a student of Adolf Loos. But this is not the only factor behind the similarities to the most important works of Loos, along with the differences. First of all, there is the distance that separates spatial configuration of the villa from the critique of ornament found in the design philosophy of Loos. In the house on Kundmanngasse Wittgenstein identifies the “language” of each detail and makes each minutely configured “word” become an individual entity that is re-composed in the rigorous design of the whole.