Anton van Norden
Anton van Norden (born June 4, 1879 in Loga (Leer) , † July 16, 1955 in Peine ) was a German architect and city architect.
Life
After the death of his father, a businessman, Anton van Norden grew up with foster parents in Bunde . About the mother Johanna Sara geb. Muchall is not known except by name.
Apprenticeship and first professional phase (1879–1910)
At the age of 14 he began a two-year apprenticeship as a carpenter and bricklayer in Cologne. This practical training was the prerequisite for studying at the Royal Building Trade School , which he attended until 1898. Several shorter positions in architecture offices followed, most recently as a site manager. After this first practical work experience in the private sector, he switched back to a university as an intern at the age of 21. He attended the Grand Ducal Technical University in Darmstadt and worked alongside Karl Hofmann's studies on various projects.
His work in the office of the Art Nouveau architect Joseph Maria Olbrich in Darmstadt, who was very well known at the turn of the century, should be emphasized . It is not known what task he had here or what buildings he accompanied; however, the influence of Olbrich and his reduced formal language is unmistakable in his own designs. After one year of military service, he worked as a technical office manager in Gießen in 1904 until he was called up for an eight-week military exercise and this job cost him. Subsequently, he was briefly for the structural engineering department of the royal Prussian railway directorate in Cologne . In February 1906 he moved to the building department of the city of Mainz . It was during this time that he married the pastor's daughter Elfriede Sperling (* 1881) from the Frankfurt (Oder) area . The son Paul Gerhard van Norden emerged from this marriage .
Despite the fact that he was not given notice of termination in Mainz, he applied in 1909 to a job advertisement from the city of Peine for the establishment of the higher girls' school (Lyceum). On March 2, 1909, he began his service as a town architect in Peine for 250 marks a month. During this time he also designed the music pavilion in the city park, which replaced the previous building in its massive design. When his superior, City Planning Officer Dr. Göbel, who left Peine in 1910, took over his duties in exchange for a special payment of 100 marks. Apparently he did not consider his professional position as provisional town planning officer to be fulfilling or sufficiently secure, so that in April 1910, strengthened by a series of inquiries from private builders, he informed the magistrate that he had decided “to establish a secure existence for the future and himself to settle in the local city as a private architect. ”They agreed on a transition period of six months, during which he would continue to work part-time - with a salary cut of 50 marks - on the completion of the lyceum.
At the end of October 1910, his employment with the city of Peine ended. The question arises as to whether the motivation for his conciliation with the magistrate comes from the desire for a future relationship with the licensing authority that is as clear as possible, or whether it should enable a “smooth” transition to professional independence.
Second professional phase (1910–1945)
The period up to the Second World War was the most successful phase of van Nord's professional activity. Shortly after founding the office, at that time still located at Hohenzollernstrasse 15 (today Kantstrasse; corner house on Goethestrasse), he received a number of larger orders, e.g. B. 1911 the parish hall of the Martin Luther parish. The good development of the office enabled him to build a villa with an office for himself on Senator-Voges-Straße as early as 1914. Apparently there was a high demand in the small town, which was probably without architects and at the time had fewer than 20,000 inhabitants. There is no other explanation for the great success in the early days. At least for a time, he must have had a “branch” of his “Office for Architecture and Applied Arts” in Bad Hersfeld , as documents for 1912 show.
Many of the buildings erected at that time are still prominent fixed points in the cityscape. In 1913, for example, van Norden built a residential and commercial building for the Jewish merchant Louis Fels on Breite Straße next to St. Jakobi Church (Peine) . A number of residential and commercial buildings followed in Peine and the surrounding area. The largest project, however, is the building of the BrauManufaktur Härke , built between 1927 and 1935 , whose in-house architect was van Norden. During the difficult professional time after the First World War, van Nord's 38-year-old Mrs. Elfriede died in 1920. The son Paul Gerhard will have been around 14 years old. In 1921 Anton married Elisabeth Tecklenburg (1891–1967), a merchant's daughter from Pein . Her father ran a grocery store in what is now the Farben-Hansen house, which van Norden provided with a high, slightly arched brick facade in 1923. There were no children from the marriage.
As a member of the Young German Order , he designed the monument for Albert Leo Schlageter on the Luhberg in Stederdorf (Peine), inaugurated in 1926 .
Third professional phase (1945–1955)
One year after the end of the Second World War, Norbert Stiller joined van Norden as office manager. This had a major impact on the architecture of van Nord's last creative period. He revised the draft of the Martin Luther Church (Peine) from 1911 by bringing it into a contemporary form; However , he retained the striking design element of the free-standing tower ( campanile ).
In the 1950s van Norden worked on various projects with his son Paul Gerhard. For example at the district vocational school (he had insisted on keeping the promise he had received in 1938) and the director's houses on Hubenweg. Unfortunately, there was a serious rift between father and son, as a result of which Paul Gerhard, who had won many competitions, left the office and Peine too. He died in Leipzig in 1979. A grandson lives in Heidelberg today.
Already seriously ill in the last years of his life, Anton van Norden died at the age of 76. His grave in the Protestant cemetery on Gunzelinstrasse is looked after by the cemetery administration. The office, which was continued by Norbert Stiller alone, remained on Senator-Voges-Straße and moved to Eulenring in 1959.
literature
- Jürgen Dieckhoff: The Gäbler Villa . Peiner Heimatkalender 1993, pp. 39-44.
- Ralf Holländer (Kreisheimatbund Peine): Anton van Norden. An architect shapes the cityscape of Peine . Peine Marketing GmbH.
- Frank Rattay: Designer on the face of home - for the 125th birthday of the Peine architect Anton van Norden . Peiner Heimatkalender 2004, pp. 69–76; Peine 2004.
- Tanja Soroka: Studies on the life and work of the architect Anton van Norden (1879–1955) . Master's thesis, University of Kiel 1992 (unpublished).
- Arthur Warstat: Searching for Traces - Peiner Architecture . Peiner Heimatkalender 1990, pp. 53-61.
Web links
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | North, Anton van |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German architect and master builder |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 4, 1879 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Loga (empty) |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 16, 1955 |
| Place of death | Torment |