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One of the pioneers of modern architecture, Le Corbusier's love affair with concrete, evident in a number of his nearly 75 projects, began early. Having already designed his first house, the Villa Fallet, at the age of just 17, in 1907 the young architect embarked on a series of travels throughout central Europe on a mission of artistic education. In Paris, he apprenticed at the office of Auguste Perret, a structural rationalist and pioneer of reinforced concrete, followed in 1910 by a short stint at Peter Behrens' practice in Berlin. These formative experiences initiated a life-long exploration of concrete in Le Corbusier's work.
Initially, the material was enticing for sheer economic purposes-where the architect desired steel frameworks, reinforced concrete consistently proved cheaper. Working together with Max Dubois and Perret, in 1915 Le Corbusier developed a theoretical study for Maison Dom-ino, a structural frame of reinforced concrete. A pun on the Latin word domus, or house, and the game of dominos, the study intended to find an affordable prefabricated system that could solve the lack of housing leftby the brutal destruction of World War I.
He quickly became fascinated, however, with the remarkable adaptability of concrete and with its sculptural and structural potential. Concrete's ability to take any shape and to be enhanced by the surfaces of various molding forms entranced Le Corbusier, and its structural promise was foundational to the formulation of his Five Points for a New Architecture: pilotis (exposed lower-story columns), free façades, open floor plan, ribbon windows, and roof gardens. The most iconic implementation of these ideas was in the Villa...