The Brno native Adolf Loos (1870–1933) ranks among the most significant figures and co-founders of Modern architecture. He was renowned as a campaigner for objectivity and usefulness in architecture and art. This remarkable figure: architect, theoretician, publicist, social commentator and “world citizen” became a legend during his own lifetime. His lecture “Ornament and Crime” defined the principles of Purist-Functionalist architecture which in his interpretation accepted influences from Ancient Greece and Classicism. He was the creator of the so-called Raumplan: a spatial layout based on varied levels connected up by short stairways.
