Crystal Buildings by Gottfried Böhm

...Böhm is one who has "secretly put his childhood in his pocket and set off to carry on playing until the end of his life." In 1986 the German architect was granted the highest international architecture award, the Pritzker Prize. Among his work the Züblin administrative building in Stuttgart from 1989 is held in special regard. "From a distance it presents the sculpture of a mountain, but the glass core is like a transparent crystal," as the architect put it himself. The image brings to mind geodes, those rock crystals surrounded by lumps of stone. Gottfried Böhm's perhaps best works are such geodes and the most beautiful among them which will captivate for many generations after us is the pilgrimage church, Mary Queen of Peace in Neviges. Morning star, heavenly crown and raw diamond – the dramatic exterior and the interior filled with magical light support each of these images. Here is given concrete shape what Reinhardt said of theatre, "a game with holy seriousness".