What is the Rietveld Schroder House?
The Rietveld Schröder House is a dwelling at Prins Hendriklaan 50 in Utrecht, designed and built in 1924 by Gerrit Rietveld for and together with Truus Schröder-Schräder. It is regarded as the only building executed wholly according to the principles of the De Stijl movement, and it has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 2000.
Truus Schröder, recently widowed, was both client and co-designer: she set the brief, and she lived in the house from January 1925 until her death in 1985.
Architectural characteristics
- Loose planes rather than a closed box. Walls, balcony slabs and supports are designed as separate planes and lines that do not touch, so the volume reads as open
- The De Stijl palette. White, several greys and black, with accents in the primary colours red, blue and yellow
- The transformable upper floor. The ground floor is still conventionally planned, but the upper floor is a single open space that sliding partitions divide into separate rooms: open by day, closed at night
- The corner without a mullion. At the corner of the living floor two casements meet with no intervening post; opened up, the corner disappears entirely and inside and outside run together
- Built-in fittings. Furniture, lighting and cupboards are integral to the design
Significance
The house is among the most influential dwellings of early modern architecture. The idea of a flexible, divisible plan and of a facade assembled from separate planes has echoed through countless designs since.
The building is open as a museum, managed from the Centraal Museum in Utrecht; visits are by guided tour and need to be booked.
Related terms
- Modernism
- Facade
- Listed building
- Renovation
- Restoration
Want to learn more about construction terms? Visit our knowledge base at fredsdiyplans.com.