Berlin's 4 Neue Sachlichkeit buildings document the "New Objectivity" movement that emerged in Weimar-era Germany as a pragmatic counterpoint to Expressionist emotion. Where Expressionism sought drama, Neue Sachlichkeit sought clarity: rational plans, standardised components, honest materials, and facades that expressed the building's structure without decoration.
Hans Poelzig's Babylon Kino represents the movement's overlap with late Expressionism — a cinema whose curved facade and streamlined interior balance rational planning with theatrical atmosphere. Walter Gropius's contributions to Siemens City and the Bauhaus Archiv-Museum show the style's mature phase, where industrial logic governed everything from window rhythms to material choices. Peter Behrens's Haus Lewin completes the set with a domestic application of the same principles: a house designed with the same rigour as a factory.
