07 – The Glass Paradise – 1 of 3 – Coloured Glass Destroys Hatred!

We begin a three-part exploration of the Glass Paradise – an early 20th vision of a better world – starting off with Bruno Ta

We begin a three-part exploration of the Glass Paradise – an early 20th vision of a better world – starting off with Bruno Taut’s extraordinary Glashaus (1914), and the even stranger text which inspired it, Paul Scheerbart’s ‘Glassarchitektur’. Conceived as a model for a new and more beautiful way of living – the Glashaus is a glimpse at a future that never came to pass, filled with jewel-like cites and kaleidoscopic colour. Also, vacuum cleaners as insect exterminators, spinning crystal globes at every door, gold-leafed factories, glass fibre soft furnishings, and the ever-present threat of zeppelin attack.

Much of our material is drawn from the excellent ’Glass! Love!! Perpetual Motion!!! A Paul Scheerbart Reader’ by Josiah McElheny & Christine Burgin (eds) (University of Chicago, 2015) – highly recommended.

Music by – Albert Campbell & Irving Gillette ‘By the dear old River Rhine’ (1911) at https://archive.org/details/edba-2410 Arthur F. Collins, Byron G. Harlan ‘On the banks of the Rhine with a Stein’ (1905) https://archive.org/details/edgm-9124 ‘Ice Chimes’ from the album ‘Disquiet Junto’ by Lee Rosevere at http://freemusicarchive.org/music/LeeRosevere/DisquietJunto ‘Tarnished Copper’ from the album ‘Marimba, Vibraphone, Chimes & Bells’ by Podington Bear at http://freemusicarchive.org/music/PodingtonBear/MarimbaVibraphoneChimes_Bells

Look at pictures on our Google+ page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/104384327113725304822

A podcast about architecture, buildings and cities, from the distant past to the present day. Plus detours into technology, film, fiction, comics, drawings, and the dimly imagined future.

With Luke Jones and George Gingell.