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SERIEN FRAU ARCHITEKT • MS. ARCHITECT

rather as an intrepid “soloist” on a difficult journey to bring about a balance between
the genders in architecture through an overdue paradigm shift, while at all times being
exposed to the danger of falling victim to the wolf’s deceitfulness. A preparatory meeting,
for which on October 5-6, 1985 some 50 female architects gathered in Cologne to present
various projects, failed to reach a consensus on the question of specifically “female
architecture”. More than a few saw themselves more as professional people than as
Verena Dietrich: Architektinnen. Ideen-Projekte-Bauten, Berlin 1986 so. The contention that feminine architecture was “better”, which in the book Dietrich
representatives of a particular sex. Whereas some saw women as having pronounced
sensitivity when it came to design, others insisted that men too were capable of being

affirmed, arguing that because of the obstacles put in their way, a woman’s job was har-
der, remained disputed. There were female architects who refused to contribute to the
book because they wanted nothing to do with Dietrich’s feminism, or who made it
known that they did not feel disadvantaged. Other refusals came from women who ran
an architecture studio with their husbands and who despite being invited, declined to
appear under the label “Women” on their own without their partner. Verena Dietrich

their husbands and become accomplices of patriarchy.
Buch Architektinnen, 1986 und alternativer Entwurf für Umschlag • Architektinnen. 1986 and Alternate cover design judged them harshly, claiming they had allowed themselves to be disempowered by
The students were her extended family

architects Schneider-Wesseling, Joachim and Margot Schürmann, Kraemer Pfennig She threw quotations by Cheryl Benard and Edith Schlaffer their way: “Women are sup-
Sieverts, Planungsgruppe dt8, and Walter von Lom as her seven years of “bondage”. For pressed. And women allow themselves to be suppressed. And women take part in the
her, becoming self-employed on October 27, 1982 meant jumping in at the deep end. She suppression of other women.” Dietrich’s Architektinnen was not the first campaign to
had neither partners nor work, but for the rest of her life Dietrich nonetheless celebrated focus on women in the profession of architect. As early as 1984, on the occasion of the
the day as her actual birthday. Competitions were her breakthrough; in 1986, she won UIFA (Union internationale des femmes architectes) congress in Berlin, there had been
first prize for her design of the spectator stand at Sportpark Höhenberg in Cologne. A logi- an exhibition. In order to judge Dietrich’s initiative fairly, one should not forget that befo-
cal and wonderfully light structure made of clearly separated elements, with a 115-meter re the Internet era, books were the dominant medium. Her book was a pioneering act,
wide stand and ascending terraces beneath a roof that projects 18 meters and appears because it brought the female architects active at the time to the attention of the public
to be almost hovering; the latter is held in place by a cable structure on six towering steel for the first time as a group of individuals. 75 years would pass from a German technical
masts, for which Verena Dietrich took her inspiration from the structural engineering of university awarding the very first degree to a female architect (Elisabeth von Knobels -
a standard construction crane. The pedestrian bridge built in 1993-94 in the “MediaPark” dorff in 1911) to this occurrence! The edifices and projects featured in the book reveal a
in Cologne, which she designed as a dynamic framework, was also the result of a com- vast spectrum of color and diversity, and as such the remarkable presence and power
petition. Awards for “Wohnen mit Kindern” (living with children) and for innovation with female architects had in the 1980s. Verena Dietrich may well have had hopes of uniting
steelwork, her work for the Association of German Architects (BDA), and not least of all her female colleagues in a mutually supportive community as militant as herself, but it
the Cologne Architecture Prize she won in 1990, cemented her reputation. After teaching never happened. In her last years at the turn of the millennium Verena Dietrich was
appointments in Siegen and Berlin, and a visiting professorship in Aachen, in 1998 she absorbed with teaching. The students were her extended family. The end of her life, at
was ultimately appointed to the Department of Design at the University of Applied the age of just 62, was brought about not by the wolf after all, but by a serious illness.
Sciences in Dortmund. In any conventional portrait of an architect, that would be it, but
not so in the case of Verena Dietrich. Her desire for freedom made her not only into a
feminist, but also into a pioneer and activist among female architects. Der Autor des Beitrages Wolfgang Voigt, Dr.-Ing. habil., hat in Hannover Architektur
studiert, war von 1986–1995 wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter an der Hochschule für
Her book „Architektinnen. Ideen – Projekte – Bauten“ appeared Bildende Künste und von 1997–2015 stellvertretender Direktor des Deutschen
Architekturmuseums Frankfurt am Main. Forschungen und Publikationen zu
Early on she had encountered subtle resistance on the part of male colleagues, which led Makroprojekten der Moderne („Atlantropa“), Architektur der Bautradtition und des
her to sense that women were not really welcome. During her “unfree” years she realized Nationalsozialismus, Architekten im Exil, Neues Frankfurt, „Queer Architects“;
that her experience as an employed female architect, which saw her, as a rule, remaining Ausstellungen und Kataloge im DAM über Heinz Bienefeld, Ernst May, Paul
anonymous behind her superiors, despite excellent designs, was typical of the fate of Schmitthenner, Paul Bonatz, Ferdinand Kramer, Dominikus Böhm, Gottfried Böhm
women. In the mid-1980s she established contact with fellow “freelance” female archi- und andere. Mitglied DWB, BDA a. O.
tects in German-speaking countries and came up with a plan to make female architects
visible as a group in their own right. The following year her book Architektinnen. Ideen Mit freundlicher Genehmigung der Heraus geber und des
– Projekte – Bauten appeared. She had asked 84 female architects to contribute to it; 62 Ernst Wasmuth Verlages wur den der gekürzte Textbeitrag
accepted the invitation, introducing themselves with a short article and illustrations of und die Abbildungen entnommen aus:
their work. Dietrich’s introductory text is informative, revealing as it does her motivation
and the sources of her ideas. Simone de Beauvoir’s “The Second Sex” (1948) made a
great impression on her, as did indirectly the Existentialism of Jean-Paul Sartre, from
which de Beauvoir had taken the terms “transcendence” and “immanence”. In Stone Age
matriarchy, it went without saying that women were also master builders, as was more Frau Architekt. Seit mehr als 100 Jahren: Frauen im
recently the case among Native Americans. Only later did the male principle triumph, the Architekturberuf
mind over life, technology over magic, the martial over the child-bearing sex. Herausgegeben von Mary Pepchinski, Christina Budde, Wolf -
Transcendence chained men to a profession, which they protected as their own territory gang Voigt und Peter Cachola Schmal. Erschienen 2017 im
from women, since when women in architecture, as elsewhere, were limited to imma- Verlag Ernst Wasmuth, Tübingen/Berlin. Deutsch/Englisch.
nence and present only as an object, onlooker, and footnote. Dietrich confronted the 316 Seiten. Hardcover. Format: 24,5 x 30,5 cm. 48,00 Euro
image she had of herself as a pioneering woman with the archetypal figure of the good ISBN 978-3-80300-829-9 (Buchhandelsausgabe)
girl in the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tales; she operated not as Little Red Riding Hood, but ISBN 978-3-80300-828-2 (Museumsausgabe)

052 • AIT 12.2018