Subject Guide: Architecture and Design

Dwelling house in a sacred space : reused synagogues in Germany (MS 455) [Digitized]

Contribution to the Congress "Sacred and Secular Buildings," Washington, May 1999, describing a project of the Institute of Architecture at the Technical University of Braunschweig in cooperation with the Center for Jewish Art in Jerusalem, which has been working on a documentation of synagogues, cemetery chapels, and ritual baths in Germany since 1994.

Erich Mendelsohn Collection (AR 1008)

The German born architect Erich Mendelsohn first designed expressionistic buildings (Einsteinturm), before becoming one of the most notable representatives of Modern architecture. Mendelsoh died in San Francisco in 1953. The collection shows photographs by Judith Turner. Depicted are details on several buildings, designed by the architect Erich Mendelsohn: these include the Bank Leumi building and the Schocken Library in Jerusalem; the Weizmann House in Rehovot, Israel; the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill, England; and a private residence in San Francisco, California.

Franz and Grete Hillinger Collection (AR 25586) [Digitized]

Franz Hillinger was born in 1895 as Ferenc (Feri) Hillinger in Grosswardein/Nagyvárad in Austria-Hungary (today Oradea, Romania), the son of Jewish parents. While studying architecture in Budapest, unrest led to Jewish students being barred from studying, so in 1919 he went to Berlin to study architecture at the Technische Hochschule Berlin-Charlottenburg, from which he graduated in 1922; while in Berlin he met Grete Grigoleit. During the 1920s, Franz Hillinger worked as an architect in Berlin and taught architecture at the Technische Hochschule Charlottenburg. The Franz and Grete Hillinger Collection holds the papers of Franz and Grete Hillinger and of other Hillinger family members. 

Fritz Nathan Collection (AR 1443) [Digitized]

During his career, Nathan built many institutional and commercial buildings as well as private homes throughout Germany. Nathan was not a student of the famous Bauhuas Academy in Dessau, however, many of his projects show the influence of the modern style of the time. The Fritz Nathan Collection consists of 21 linear feet of architectural drawings, drafts, and designs, along with photos and correspondence concerning his business projects as well as private papers and files concerning his restitution case against Germany after World War II. Several of his major projects are documented from early charcoal designs through blue prints to photos of the building in various stages of construction and finally pictures of the finished structure. He kept published articles and accounts of his work from professional journals to clippings in dailies.

Guide to the Architectural Records in the Hadassah Archives (I-578/RG 21)

The materials in the record group mostly consist of reproductions of building plans of the Hadassah hospitals on Mount Scopus and Ein Kerem from the 1920s to the 2000s. Other properties documented in the record group include buildings managed by Youth Aliyah, Hadassah Youth Services, Young Judaea, Hadassah Israel Education Services, the National Office, and the Hadassah Medical Organization. These records document a core Hadassah function, the building of medical and social service facilities in Palestine/Israel.

Harry R. Rosen Community Building Consultants records (I-577)

The Harry R. Rosen Community Building Consultants Records consist of photographs, research, and administrative documentation by and for the dozens of Jewish Community Centers (JCCs) in the United States, Canada, and Israel that Harry R. Rosen and his firm helped develop from the 1970s to the early 2000s.

Norbert Troller Collection (AR 7268) [Digitized]

Born in Bruenn, Austria-Hungary (now Brno, Czechoslovakia) in 1896, Norbert Troller served as a soldier in World War I, spending time as a prisoner-of-war in Italy. After the war he studied architecture in Brno and Vienna and worked as an architect in Brno until the German occupation of Czechoslovakia. He was deported to Theresienstadt in 1942, where he worked as an architect for the Jewish self-administration of the camp, and produced works of art as well. In 1944 he was imprisoned by the Gestapo, and was sent to Auschwitz later that year. After liberation, he lived briefly in Cracow, and then reopened his architectural business in Prague and Brno. He emigrated to the United States in 1948 and worked for the National Jewish Welfare Board in New York designing Jewish community centers, before opening his own practice.

Rachel Wischnitzer collection (AR 25657) [Digitized]

Rachel Wischnitzer née Bernstein was born in Minsk, Russia, on April 15, 1885, to Wladimir Bernstein and Sophie Bernstein née Halpern. Upon her graduation from Gymnasium in Warsaw in 1902, she studied at the University of Heidelberg (1902-1903), Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels (1903-1905), and the École Spéciale d'Architecture in Paris (1905-1907), from which she received her diploma in architecture. She then worked on the staff of the Evreiskaia Entsiklopediia (Russian-language Jewish Encyclopedia). Wischnitzer earned her master’s degree in 1944, specializing in synagogue architecture; she taught fine arts at Yeshiva University’s Stern College for Women from 1956 until her retirement in 1968. The Rachel Wischnitzer Collection contains correspondence, lecture notes, photographs, lantern slides, and negatives documenting Rachel Wischnitzer’s career as an art historian, curator, professor, consultant, and author. Also included are correspondence, records, and photographs pertaining to her husband Mark Wischnitzer’s work as a historian, editor, and Secretary General of the Hilfsverein der Deutschen Juden.

Rudolf Joseph Collection (AR 2180) [Digitized]

Rudolf Joseph was born in Pforzheim, Germany, on August 14, 1893. He trained as an architect in Dresden and Karlsruhe. He initially worked in France, Poland and Germany, where he designed a variety of public and private buildings, such as offices and military buildings. In the 1930s he worked mostly in Paris, where he designed a new synagogue and a pavilion for the ‘Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne’ in 1937. He immigrated to the United States in the late 1930s. The Rudolf Joseph Collection consists mainly of documents pertaining to his architectural work and research in Germany, France and the United States. Included are manuscripts and articles written by Joseph on the history and theory of modern architecture, as well as proposals and sketches of his own designs. Also included are newspaper clippings by or about Joseph, as well as various documents pertaining to modern architecture in Europe, especially the architectural activities of the Jewish community.

American synagogues : a century of architecture and Jewish community / Samuel D. Gruber ; photography by Paul Roceleau ; edited by Scott J. Tilden. New York : Rizzoli, 2003.

Faith, spirit, and identity : synagogue architecture in America / Henry & Daniel Stolzman ; with an essay by Lawrence Hoffman. Mulgrave, Vic. : Images ; Woodbridge : ACC Distribution, 2004.

Jewish architecture in Europe / edited by Aliza Cohen-Mushlin and Harmen H. Thies. Petersberg : Michael Imhof Verlag ; [Braunschweig] : Bet Tfila, 2010.

Synagogue architecture and planning : an annotated bibliography / Linda Perlis Black. Monticello, Ill. : Council of Planning Librarians, 1978.

The architecture of Jewish settlements in the prairies : a pictorial history / Cyril Edel Leonoff/ S.l. : s.n., 1975.

The Golden age : synagogues of Spain in history and architecture / Meir Ben-Dov. Jerusalem ; New York : Urim, 2009.

The Jewish contribution to modern architecture, 1830-1930 / Fredric Bedoire. Jersey City, NJ : KTAV Pub. House, 2004.

The synagogues of Kentucky : architecture and history / Lee Shai Weissbach. Lexington, KY : University Press of Kentucky, 1995.

Google Arts and Culture

Discovering the Synagogues and Other Jewish Architecture of Sub-Saharan Africa

A Collection of Watercolor Renderings by Jay A. Waronker