Among the vast treasures of the V&A Museum’s huge London Storehouse is an example of what is likely the world’s first fitted kitchen, and an important example of what its designer called “social architecture”—architecture aimed to serve masses of people, not just the wealthy.
Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, the young Austrian architect who created it in 1926 for the public housing agency in Frankfurt, Germany, was a self-confessed non-cook. She created the design after hours and hours of conversation with working-class women about what they needed to make their unpaid labor more efficient and hygienic.
The result, which was installed in more than 10,000 apartments in Frankfurt, included pull-out chopping boards, easily-cleaned surfaces, built-in bins and cupboards and all installed for easiest reach despite the small space allotted to it.
Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky became so widely associated with her kitchen ‘revolution’ that she later in life insisted to people that “I am not a kitchen!” and in fact she was much more. Outside her professional life, which included years of work in Germany, Austria, the Soviet Union, Turkey and Cuba, she remained politically active until her death in 2000 at age 103. During World War II, she returned from Turkey to Austria as a member of the communist resistance to Hitler; she spent several years in Nazi prisons before being liberated in 1945.
For a deeper appreciation of her life, click HERE
