The Co-op Principle - Hannes Meyer and the Concept of Collective Design

The Co-op Principle - Hannes Meyer and the Concept of Collective Design

Cooperatives, sharing communities, co-housing – the collective is in high demand. At the end of the 1920s the Bauhaus took a keen interest in addressing questions surrounding the relationship between society and design, between individual and collaborative creation and production. The second Bauhaus director Hannes Meyer played a key role here radically orienting the school’s teaching and workshops and its planning and architecture around the idea and needs of the collective. Meyer’s concept of a collaborative design process was particularly revolutionary. This so-called co-op principle is now the subject of an exhibition at the Dessau Bauhaus running from 21 May to 4 October 2015.

Hannes Meyer (1889 – 1954), Swiss architect and second director of the Bauhaus in Dessau from 1928 to 1930. He emigrated to the Soviet Union, and subsequently to Mexico City, where he worked as the director of the Instituto del Urbanismo y Planificación.

Design: Prill Vieceli Cremers, Zürich