Two Doors and Two Pairs of Original Door Handles from Villa Schießl

In 1911, the Darmstadt-based periodical Deutsche Kunst und Dekoration, then one of the most recognised art magazines, published an article on the Villa Schießl in St. Pölten when it had only recently been completed by Hans Ofner (1880-1939). The reviewer emphasised Ofner’s remarkable and accomplished achievement of adapting a former factory as a residential building. Hans Ofner based the general idea for his reconstruction on the concept of a “gesamtkunstwerk” or “total work of art”. As Ofner had been a student of Josef Hoffmann at the Vienna School of Applied Arts between 1903 and 1907, it was only natural that he would have familiarised himself with this idea, according to which all architectural and decorative details needed to be subordinated to a uniform overall design. This also included the doors to all of the rooms in the building, for which Ofner resorted to Josef Hoffmann’s return to the plain geometric forms originally developed during the Biedermeier period. One of the principal features of this uniform design concept, which was actually rooted in domestic traditions, was the creation of a perfect harmony between functional and emotional values. Geometric abstraction and cosy warmth ideally blended together, which is also exemplified by the present door. Christian Witt-Dörring