Internationally acclaimed architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe studies the model of a new building he designed to house his department at the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology, in Chicago, Illinois, on June 10, 1954. (AP Photo).

Their buildings and city plans changed the way we live and what our cities and suburbs look like today. Their work has inspired architects from their time to the present.

This has been brought to light again just this month by three new books on Le Corbusier published in France to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his death — a publishing event important enough to have been covered in detail recently in The New York Times. Corbusier (1887-1965), though he was often imitated in the States, is not well known by the public here. But he had a vast influence on architecture and city planning worldwide, especially in Europe, Japan and Latin America. 

In France today, he is accused of being a fascist. All three books are critical of the architect. Two have revealing titles — “Le Corbusier, a French Facism” and “Le Corbusier, a Cold Vision of the World.” What the books seek to demonstrate, The New York Times reported, is that he was an authoritarian at his core, and this authoritarianism informed his designs.....Continue Reading

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