Wells Coates - Role As A Modernist

Role As A Modernist

Wells embraced Le Corbusier's architectural mantra that buildings should be 'machines for living' (machine à habiter). This ideal was best-reflected in his Isokon building (also known as Lawn Road Flats), completed in 1934. Indeed, the architectural critic J. M. Richards suggested that he improved on Corbusier, coming "nearer to the machine à habiter than anything Corbusier ever designed". The building was compared to the exterior of an ocean liner by the novelist Agatha Christie, who lived there for a time, so clean and striking was the design.

The apartment building was the brainchild of Jack and Molly Pritchard, who in 1931 established a design firm featuring Modernist architecture and furniture. With simple living spaces strongly influenced by Coates' Japanese experience, and including built-in Isokon furniture, Isokon was "an experiment in collective housing designed for left-wing intellectuals". It became a haven for Germans escaping Nazi persecution and hosted many famous personages including Christie, Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer.

Isokon was ahead of its time: it won second place in Horizon Magazine's 'Ugliest Building Competition' in 1946, and would not be recognized as one of England's most important Modernist buildings for another decade. The building fell into disrepair by the 1990s but it changed ownership in 2001 and was fully restored by 2004.