Architecture has the ability to heal people. This is shown in Karl Marx-Hof, the public pool Amalienbad, and the reading about the sanatorium.
Karl Marx-Hof is a public housing community that was built during Red Vienna. These large complexes filled with apartments allowed for residents in Vienna to live at a lower cost as well as have access to improved hygiene. The workers of the time could not afford to live in sanitary conditions in the city, so the Social Democratic Party rose to power to represent their needs. The excessively rich were taxed for their luxury goods, and public social housing began to flourish.
With the advent of more sanitary conditions in Karl Marx-Hof and other housing, less people died of tuberculosis. There was a “mud room” that prevented residents from tracking outside mud and street bacteria into their close living quarters. They had windows to the outside that allowed sunlight in. The tour guide mentioned how the UV rays from sunlight has a slight sterilization ability to kill germs.
Residents also had their own toilet for each apartment instead of one on each floor for all tenants. Every apartment has running water, which was luxurious and unusual for the time. Although they bathed communally on one floor, it was cheap and most families could go once a week. These new developmentsu allowed for physical healing within the tenants. Diseases that had killed thousands of Viennese were less threatening, residents could bathe more accessibly, and the access to sunlight lifted the mood in the poor.
The Purkersdorf Sanatorium also implemented special architectural designs to help the patients with mental health issues. In “An Architecture for Modern Nerves: Josef Hoffman’s Purkersdorf Sanatorium,” Topp related an excerpt from the architect Lux who wrote about the sanatorium as a house of health, saying, “it is not only the bath facilities and ingenious muscle-strengthening machines which play an important role in this, but also light, air and sun…which stream through the windows.” He say how windows and fresh light and “good air” could mentally heal the patients. If seeing sunlight can help cure those afflicted with mental illness, it can also provide mental relief to those struggling to survive in Karl Marx-Hof.
Another place built for health is Amalienbad, the public swimming pool. The desk worker said that between 1000 to 2000 people visit each day for the cheap price of four euros. I looked through the windows and saw many elder people doing laps and treading water. Hardly any children played in the pool from what I could tell of it. Natural sunlight poured in onto the pool area, and intricate jtiles lined the ceiling in the entrance. This was made to be a public exercise area that prioritizes the health of their customers.
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