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[26/05/2025]
Bird’s-Eye View
In Architecture Competitions
The bird’s-eye view is a visualizing technique, where things are depicted from above as if seen from a flying bird. While it has been an imaginative perspective in the visual arts for millennia, since the late 19th century the human conquest of the air and the invention of photography accomplished the factual depiction of the world from above. The following contribution will focus on bird’s-eye views in the field of architecture, and more specifically on its use in architecture competitions in the early 20th century.
Competitions are a common method to receive a variety of solutions for an architectural problem, with a jury of experts choosing the best option to be realized. The program of a competition along with planning documents are procured by its jury and explains the project's requirements and particularities to the participants. Today, the list of drawings that are to be furnished often includes aerial perspectives. However, when bird’s-eye views were first introduced to competitions in the late 19th century, their benefits were discussed controversially. While some feared that a skilled visualizer could blind the jury and the overall quality of entries would diminish, others saw the potential in aerial perspectives to communicate complex situations three-dimensionally to both experts and laymen (Rasch 2022). Thus, when aerial photography became more common after WWI, the architectural profession had not gotten entirely used to the idea of the aerial perspective in competitions, yet. However, a development can be traced throughout the first half of the century. The city of Zurich purchased aerial photographs as early as 1916 for the use in urban competitions (Stadler 2010, 12) and the German geodesist and urbanist Alfred Abendroth announced in 1929 that oblique aerial photographs rendered a site visit obsolete altogether (Abendroth 1929, 205). In this context, the 1926 competition for the Palais des Nations (PdN) in Geneva paradigmatically demonstrates the status quo of the aerial moment in architectural competitions during the interwar period.
Furthermore, the requirement that one of the two furnished perspectives had to be aerial obliged all competing architects to engage with their projects from above. The analysis of the entered aerial perspectives shows a strong influence of Mittelholzer’s photographs on the contestants’ visualisations. Of the 377 entries, roughly 120 are documented in archives or contemporary articles, and hardly any are complete (League of Nations 1927a; 1927b; Martin 1929; Meyenburg 1927; Piacentini 1928). While some of the low-angle bird’s-eye views appear to be depicting the axially centered building from a nearby hill, drawing from a traditional iconography of baroque palaces (see image 3), most of the perspectives are significantly steeper and incite a feeling of movement and accidentality, mimicking Mittelholzer’s photographs (see image 2). Focusing on the Perle-du-lac, the buildings are off-centered and slanted. One intriguing characteristic of aerial photography, according to competitor Hans Bernoulli, is the shift of the horizon beyond our usual gaze (Bernoulli 1921, 87). In fact, most of the aerial perspectives show no horizon. This new perspective fascinated the observer as it stimulated a sensation of vertigo.
The competition for the PdN is an extraordinary example of the implementation of a new medium in both the architectural design and theory. It acted as a catalyst for aerial photography’s debut in the international architectural discourse and inspired experimental methodologies among the contestants. It marks a turning point in the history of visualizing architectural projects, with traditional approaches on one hand and, on the other, compositions heavily influenced by the innovative and most promising mode of intercultural understanding: the airplane. Therefore, the implementation of aerial photography in the architectural competition for the PdN epitomizes the League of Nation’s ambitions for global understanding. Or, to put it in Mittelholzer’s words:
"Just as the railway generated a new worldview, aviation will alter ours. Even if today‘s peoples isolate themselves in narrow national egoism, the time will come when aeronautics will shatter this artificial situation".
(Unpublished Manuscript, Walter Mittelholzer, Verkehrshaus Luzern)All translations by author.
Cited Works:
Abendroth, Alfred. 1929. “Städtebau Und Luftbild.” Edited by Werner Hegemann. Städtebau. Begründet von 1904 von Camillo Sitte, no. 24, 201–6.
Bernoulli, Hans. 1921. “Aero-Photos.” Das Werk. Architektur Und Kunst 8 (4). https://www.e-periodica.ch//digbib/volumes?UID=wbw-002.
League of Nations. 1927a. Concours d’architecture. Pour l’édification d’un Palais de La Société Des Nations, à Genève = Architectural Competition. For the Erection of a League of Nations Building at Geneva. Genève: Société d’Editions.
———. 1927b. Projects Soumis Au Concours d’architecture: [Pour l’édification d’un Palais de La Société Des Nations à Genève], 1927. Designs Submitted in the Architectural Competition [for the Erection of a League of Nations Building at Geneva], 1927. Genève?
Martin, Camille. 1929. “Le Palais de La S.D.N.” Text/html,application/pdf,text/html. Das Werk. Architektur Und Kunst 16 (3). https://doi.org/10.5169/SEALS-15919.
Meyenburg, K. von. 1927. “Le concours pour l’édification d’un palais de la société des nations à Genève.” Text/html,application/pdf,text/html. Das Werk. Architektur und Kunst 14 (7). https://doi.org/10.5169/SEALS-86293.
Piacentini, Marcello. 1928. “Problemi Reali Più Che Razionalismo Preconcetto.” Architettura e Arti Decorative 8 (1): 103–13.
Rasch, Marco. 2022. “The Influence of the Photographic Birds-Eye View on German Urbanism.” In Aerial Spatial Revolution in Architecture and Urbanism – Online-Symposium. Mendrisio. https://aerialspatialrevolution.ch.
Stadler, Hilar, ed. 2010. Eduard Spelterini Und Das Spektakel Der Bilder. Die Kolorierten Lichtbilder Des Ballonpioniers = Eduard Spelterini and the Spectacle of Images. The Colored Slides of the Pioneer Balloonist. Zürich: Scheidegger & Spiess.
Cited Archives:
gta Archiv: Letter from Karl to Werner Moser, 31.01.1925, 4-K-8-1925-01-31.
Library and Archives of the United Nations Geneva: Construction d’une salle des assemblees Jury international d’architectes. Procès-verbal de la deuxième session, Janvier 1926, R1541-32-49424-28594.
–––. Programme and Rules for the Architectural Competition for the Erection of a League of Nations Building at Geneva, COL37bis-16-2.
Verkehrshaus der Schweiz Luzern: Unpublished Manuscript, Walter Mittelholzer, VA-48259 II Diverse Texte.