Karl Friedrich Schinkel (1781–1841) was a Prussian architect, city planner, and painter who also designed furniture and stage sets. Schinkel was one of the most prominent architects of Germany and designed both neoclassical and neogothic buildings. His most famous buildings are found in and around Berlin. He became a student of architect Friedrich Gilly (1772–1800) (the two became close friends) and his father, David Gilly, in Berlin. At that time, the architectural style in Prussia was shaped in neoclassical style, mainly by Carl Gotthard Langhans, the architect of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

Two examples of Italian eclecticism: Alessandro Antonelli and Alfredo D’Andrade

Alessandro Antonelli (1798–1888) elaborated a functional ideal of architecture, which inspired him with an ambitious plan of renovation of Turin’s historical center. In 1836 (remaining un­til 1857), he became a pro­fessor of the Albertina Aca­demy. He was also a deputy in the Kingdom of Sardinia’s Parliament and a member of Turin’s communal council and of the Province of Novara’s one. In this period he designed numerous works: several residences, the communal seta and the Sanctuary of Boca (whose dome was never completed due to crumbling risks), a villa at Romagnano Sesia, the Orphans’ Hospice in Alessan­dria, the regulation plans of Ferrara and Novara, the church of San Clement, and the Asilo de Me­dici in Bellinzago Novarese. The church of Borgolavezzaro (1858–1862) was also finished without the dome, due to high costs. Noteworthy is the Basilica of San Gaudenzio in Novara, finished in 1887. It is an audacious construction in brickwork, standing 121 m tall. Also from him in Novara are the Casa Bossi and the Cathedral.

Antonelli’s most famous work is the Mole Antonelliana, the symbol of Turin, named after him and begun in 1863 as a Jewish synagogue. It was completed in 1897 and restored in 1961 after a violent hurricane.

Alfredo Cesar Reis Freire de Andrade, also known simply as Alfredo d’Andrade (1839–1915), was a Portuguese architect, archaeologist, and naturalized Italian painter who had Italian citizenship conferred on him in 1912, three years before his death.

Among other things, he was responsible for the design of the Castello d’Albertis in Genoa. After a short period in Geneva, in 1865 he moved permanently to Italy, teaching ornate and dedicating himself to the relief of historic buildings. Thanks to these activities, he matured a deep knowledge of the buildings of Piedmont, Liguria, and Valle d’Aosta, showing particular interest in those of the medieval period.

He becomes Supervisor of Fine Arts in Liguria and Piedmont, directing all the restoration of churches and castles carried out until 1915 in those regions, including the Sacra of San Michele. The sum of precious material allowed him to take care of the construction of the Medieval Borough of Turin, sited in the “Valentine Park," as an official building in the Italian Universal Exposition of 1884. The Borough constitutes one of his most important works because D’Andrade recreated a small and faithful medieval quarter, taking inspiration from the architectural experiences achieved so far.

Another interesting example of Eclectic Architecture is the Eastern Side of “Carignano Palace” in Turin. This building was created by Domenico Ferri (with help) in 1871. Originally destined as the new House of Italian Parliament, it is a perfect example of "Eclecticism,” where you can find Neoclassic columns mixed with Barock windows and Renaissance’s structures.

Architecture at the rise of a modern age

The “Vienna Secession”: Otto Wagner

Otto Koloman Wagner (1841–1918) was an Austrian architect, furniture designer, and urban planner. He was a leading member of the Vienna Secession movement of architecture, founded in 1897, and the broader Art Nouveau movement. The main part of his works is sited in his native city of Vienna, testifying the rapid evolution of architecture during the XIX and XX centuries. His early works were inspired by classical architecture. During the middle of the 1890s, he had already designed several buildings in what became known as the Vienna Secession style. Beginning in 1898, with his designs of Vienna Metro stations, his style became floral and Art Nouveau, with decoration by Koloman Moser. His later works, 1906 until his death in 1918, had geometric forms and minimal ornament, clearly expressing their function. They are considered predecessors to modern architecture.

The Church of Saint Leopold built in Penzing, near Vienna—again with decoration by Koloman Moser—is a feast of whatever is intended as “Art Nouveau." The inside views are a compelling example of the birth of a new language in the world of fine arts, while the Postal Savings Bank is the start of modern meanings.

The “Vienna Secession”: Adolf Loos

Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos (1870–1933) was an Austrian architect and influential European theorist of modern architecture. His essay Ornament and Crime advocated smooth and clear surfaces in contrast to the lavish decorations of the fin de siècle, as well as the more modern aesthetic principles of the Vienna Secession, exemplified in his design of Looshaus, Vienna. Loos became a pioneer of modern architecture and contributed a body of theory and criticism of modernism in architecture and design and developed the “Raumplan” (literally spatial plan) method of arranging interior spaces, exemplified in Villa Müller in Prague. He suffered from poor health, including an inherited hearing affliction. Although acknowledged as a great and revolutionary architect, he was convicted as a pedophile in 1928 for exploiting girls from poor families, aged 8 to 10. He died, aged 62, on August 23, 1933, in Kalksburg, near Vienna.

An Architect Near the “Berlin Secession”: Peter Behrens

Peter Behrens (1868–1940) was a leading German architect, graphic designer, and industrial designer, best known for his early pioneering AEG Turbine Hall in Berlin in 1909. He had a long career, designing objects, typefaces, and important buildings in a range of styles from the 1900s to the 1930s. He was a founding member of the German Werkbund in 1907, when he also began designing for AEG and pioneered corporate design and graphic design, producing typefaces, objects, and buildings for the company. In the next few years, he became a successful architect and a leader of the rationalist/classical German Reform Movement of the 1910s. After WW1, he turned to Brick Expressionism, designing the remarkable Hoechst Administration Building outside Frankfurt, and from the mid-1920s increasingly to New Objectivity. He was also an educator, heading the architecture school at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna from 1922 to 1936.

As a well-known architect, he produced designs across Germany, in other European countries, Russia, and England. Several of the leading names of European modernism worked for him when they were starting out in the 1910s, including Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, and Walter Gropius.

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867–1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright believed in designing in harmony with humanity and the environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture. This philosophy was exemplified in Fallingwater (1935), which has been called “the best all-time work of American architecture." Wright played a key role in the architectural movements of the twentieth century, influencing architects worldwide through his work and the work of hundreds of apprentices who studied at the Taliesin Fellowship. He also designed original and innovative offices, churches, schools, skyscrapers, hotels, museums, and other commercial projects. Wright-designed interior elements (including furniture, tableware, zinc-clad windows, and carpeting) were integrated into these structures. He wrote several books and numerous articles and was a popular lecturer in the United States and in Europe. Wright was recognized in 1991 by the American Institute of Architects as “the greatest American architect of all time." In 2019, a selection of his work became a listed World Heritage Site as The 20th-Century Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright.

Paintings and sculptures at the rise of a modern age

Vienna Secession: Egon Schiele

Egon Leo Adolf Ludwig Schiele (1890–1818) was an Austrian Expressionist painter. A close friend of Gustav Klimt, Schiele was a major figurative painter of the early 20th century. His work is noted for its intensity, its raw sexuality, and the many self-portraits the artist produced, including nude self-portraits. The twi­sted body shapes and the expressive line that characterize Schie­le’s paintings and drawings mark the artist as an early exponent of Expressionism.

Vienna Secession: Gustav Klimt

Gustav Klimt (1862–1818) was an Austrian symbolist painter and one of the most prominent members of the Vienna Secession movement. Remarkable artist for his paintings, murals, sketches, and other objets d’art. Klimt’s primary subject was the female body, and his works are marked by an evident eroticism. Amongst his figurative works, which include allegories and portraits, he painted landscapes. Also, Japanese art and its methods were collected among his main influences. Talented decorator, he began to develop a more personal style; his work was the subject of controversy criticized as pornographic when he completed the paintings for the ceiling of the Great Hall of the University of Vienna in 1900. Subsequently, he refused public commissions but achieved a new success with the paintings of his “golden phase," many of which include the use of gold leaf. Klimt’s work was an important influence on his younger peer, Egon Schiele.

Berlin Secession: Ernst Barlach

Ernst Heinrich Barlach (1870–1938) was a German expressionist sculptor, medalist, printmaker, and writer, a former member of the Berlin Secession. Although he was enthusiastic about going to World War I, his participation was disappointed by the war horrors and changing his position. He became mostly known for his sculptures protesting against the war. Prosecuted during the rise of the Nazi Party, when most of his works were confiscated as degenerate art. Stylistically, Barlach belongs to the pillars of twentieth-century realism and expressionism.

Design and fashion from “Art Nouveau” and “Art Deco”

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts, known in different languages by different names: Jugendstil in German, Stile Liberty in Italian, Modernisme català in Catalan, etc. For the Anglo-Saxon world, it is also known as the Modern Style. The style was most popular between 1890 and 1910 during the Belle Époque period that ended with the start of World War I in 1914. It was a reaction against the academic art, eclecticism, and historicism of 19th-century architecture and decoration. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and flowers. Other characteristics of Art Nouveau were a sense of dynamism and movement, often given by asymmetry or whiplash lines, and the use of modern materials, particularly iron, glass, ceramics, and later concrete, to create unusual forms and larger open spaces.

Art Deco

Art Deco, sometimes referred to as Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and design that first appeared in France just before World War I. It influenced the design of buildings, furniture, jewelry, fashion, cars, movie theaters, trains, ocean liners, and everyday objects such as radios and vacuum cleaners. It took its name, short for Arts Décoratifs, from the Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes (International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts) held in Paris in 1925.

This style mixed modern styles with fine craftsmanship and rich materials. During its heyday, it represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in social and technological progress.

From its outset, Art Deco was influenced by the bold geometric forms of Cubism and the Vienna Secession; the bright colors of Fauvism and from the Ballets Russes; the updated craftsmanship of the furniture of the eras of Louis Philippe I and Louis XVI; and the exoticized styles of China and Japan, India, Persia, ancient Egypt, and Maya art. It featured rare and expensive materials, such as ebony and ivory, and exquisite craftsmanship. The Chrysler Building and other skyscrapers of New York City built during the 1920s and 1930s are monuments of the style.