Lotte Cohn

Lotte Cohn (; 1893-1983) was a German Israeli architect and pioneer in the development of Israeli architecture. She played a key role in disseminating early Modernist ideas in Israel and was a pioneer of Brutalist architecture.

Personal life Recha Charlotte Cohn was born on August 20, 1893, in Charlottenburg, Berlin to Bernhard Cohn, a Jewish medical doctor, and Cäcilie Cohn. She was the youngest of seven children. Her brother, Emil Cohn, was a well-known writer and playwright, who published under the pseudonym, Emil Bernhard. Her eldest sister, Helene Cohn, founded the League of Jewish Women for Gymnastics and Sport in 1910, and performed gymnastics at the Eleventh Zionist Congress in Vienna, Austria, in 1913.

In 1912 Cohn matriculated at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin (today Technische Universität Berlin); she graduated from the university's faculty of architecture in 1916, as one of the first women to do so. Between March 1917 and April 1919, Lotte worked in the reconstruction offices of Pillkallen, Tilsit and Gumbinnen in East Prussia. After returning to Berlin, she was employed as an assistant in the office of Zionist architect, Richard Michel.

After accepting the job of first assistant to the architect and city planner, Richard Kauffmann in 1921, Cohn moved to Jerusalem, Mandatory Palestine, with her sisters, Helene and Rosa. Her brother, Max, followed two years later with his family, and her mother emigrated to Mandatory Palestine in 1932.

Lotte Cohn died in Tel Aviv on April 7, 1983.

Career After graduating in 1916, Cohn worked in the reconstruction offices of Pillkallen, Tilsit and Gumbinnen in East Prussia from March 1917 until April 1919. After returning to Berlin, she was employed as an assistant in the office of Zionist architect, Richard Michel.

In Jerusalem, she worked in the office of architect Richard Kauffmann. Much of Cohn's work during this period focused on the development of a distinct Israeli architectural style.

In 1923, Cohn was one of the founding members of the Association of Architects in Palestine, which would later become the Association of Engineers and Architects in Israel. In 1934, she was one of the founding members of the Architect's circle, which was meant to continue the work of the Berlin-based Architect's circle that had been dissolved in 1933 and had counted Walter Gropius, the Taut Brothers, Erich Mendelsohn and Mies van der Rohe as members.

In 1927, due to the worsening economic situation in Mandatory Palestine, the city's urban development office was closed and Cohn found a position with the Chief Architect of the Public Works Department of Mandatory Palestine, Austen St. Barbe Harrison.

Due to the influx of Jewish refugees from Europe, many of her designs were for housing. She introduced modernist ideas to Israel, adapting them to local conditions, with the style becoming particularly prominent in the White City of Tel Aviv. Many of her designs incorporated features (i.e. recessed windows and projecting panels) that would later be recognized as Brutalist.

In 1929, Cohn left Kauffmann's office, founding her own firm, where she remained until her retirement in 1968.

Accomplishments and works