| Popis: |
The departments of Moselle, Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin were ceded to the German Empire from 1871 to 1918 by the Treaty of Frankfurt. As the capital of the Reichsland of Alsace-Lorraine, Strasburg has experienced very strong urban growth, the municipal office in charge of construction increasing from 12 to nearly 150 employees during this period. This paper analyzes the daily practices of the construction office and tries to demonstrate that communal and liberal praxis are not that far from each other. Some surprising similarities appear in terms of work organization and management in the functioning of a liberal architecture agency. At first, the evolution of the specialization of municipal services during the German annexation are approached with a particular structure’s presentation, the building police, which is still in existence today, including in terms of its denomination. Two prominent figures from the Strasbourg architectural scene, Édouard Schimpf (1877-1916) and Fritz Beblo (1872-1947), are mentioned in this contribution. With his fluctuation between the public and private spheres, Schimpf has shown that he places the architectural project above questions of status. Beblo, as head of the municipal architecture department, implemented management and steering tools that were innovative at the time. He also managed to impose his views in the least administrative way possible by participating personally in a competition organized by the municipality, which was his employer. |
