André Lurçat was a French modernist architect, landscape architect, furniture designer and city planner, a founding member of CIAM

CIAM

CIAM may refer to:* Commission Internationale Aeromodelling, a section of Fédération Aéronautique Internationale* Congrès International d'Architecture Moderne, the International Congress of Modern Architecture...

, and active in the rebuilding in French cities after World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. He was the brother of visual artist Jean Lurçat

Jean Lurçat

Jean Lurçat was a French artist noted for his role in the revival of contemporary tapestry.-Biography:He was born in Bruyères, Vosges, the son of Lucien Jean Baptiste Lurçat and Marie Emilie Marguerite L'Hote. He was the brother of André Lurçat, who became an architect...

.

Lurçat was born in Bruyères

Bruyères

Bruyères is a commune in the Vosges department in Lorraine in northeastern France.The town built up around a castle built on a hill in the locality in the 6th century. It was the birthplace of Jean Lurçat, in 1892.-History:...

, studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts

École des Beaux-Arts

École des Beaux-Arts refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The most famous is the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, now located on the left bank in Paris, across the Seine from the Louvre, in the 6th arrondissement. The school has a history spanning more than 350 years,...

 in Nancy, worked in the office of Robert Mallet-Stevens

Robert Mallet-Stevens

Robert Mallet-Stevens was a French architect and designer. Along with Le Corbusier he is widely regarded as the most influential figure in French architecture in the period between the two World Wars....

, began building a series of houses in the 1920s, and became interested in the principles of social housing to address the French housing crisis between the wars. In 1928 he was a founding member of the Congrès International d'Architecture Moderne

Congrès International d'Architecture Moderne

The Congrès internationaux d'architecture moderne – CIAM was an organization founded in 1928 and disbanded in 1959, responsible for a series of events and congresses arranged around the world by the most prominent architects of the time, with the objective of spreading the principles of the Modern...

 (International Congress of Modern Architecture). Along with Adolf Loos

Adolf Loos

Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos was a Moravian-born Austro-Hungarian architect. He was influential in European Modern architecture, and in his essay Ornament and Crime he repudiated the florid style of the Vienna Secession, the Austrian version of Art Nouveau...

, Richard Neutra

Richard Neutra

Richard Joseph Neutra is considered one of modernism's most important architects.- Biography :Neutra was born in Leopoldstadt, the 2nd district of Vienna, Austria Hungary, on April 8, 1892. He was born into both-Jewish wealthy family...

, Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky

Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky

Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky was the first female Austrian architect and an activist in the Nazi resistance movement. She is mostly remembered today for designing the so-called Frankfurt Kitchen.-Training:...

 and others, he demonstrated a family residence at the Vienna Werkbund exhibition of 1932, produced his best-known villa Hefferlin at Ville-d'Avray

Ville-d'Avray

Ville-d'Avray is a commune in the western suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris. The commune is served by the Boulogne-Billancourt prefecture, of the Hauts-de-Seine department.-Transport:...

, then went to Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 to work for the Soviet government 1934-1937.

Lurçat is known for advancing the cause of modernism in landscape architecture; he took a position, contrary to the proponents of Existenzminimum, that all social housing must include gardens.
He is also known for his planned postwar reconstruction of the French city of Maubeuge

Maubeuge

Maubeuge is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.It is situated on both banks of the Sambre , east of Valenciennes and about from the Belgian border.-History:...

 (1945). He was a professor at the École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs

École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs

The École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs is a public university of art and design and is one of the most prestigious French grande école...

 and the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts

École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts

The École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-arts is the distinguished National School of Fine Arts in Paris, France.The École des Beaux-arts is made up of a vast complex of buildings located at 14 rue Bonaparte, between the quai Malaquais and the rue Bonaparte, in the heart of Saint-Germain-des-Près,...

in Paris from 1945-1947, and a member of the board of architecture of the Ministry of Reconstruction and Urban Development.

Selected writings

• Architecture, Paris: Au Sans Pareil, 1929.
• Formes, composition et lois d'harmonie: Eléments d'une science de l'esthétique architecturale, Paris, Editions Vincent, Fréal & Cie, 1953.
• Œuvres récentes, Paris, Editions Vincent, Fréal & Cie, 1961.