Functionalism (architecture)

Functionalism is the architectural principle that a building should be designed based solely on its purpose and practical use rather than for decorative effect. An international functionalist movement arose after the First World War as part of the wider wave of Modernism, achieving its greatest prominence from the 1920s through the 1960s, with especially strong early adoption in Czechoslovakia, Germany, Poland, the Soviet Union and the Netherlands, and later in Scandinavia and Finland. Functionalist buildings favor radically simplified forms over the ornamentation of earlier styles, and the movement was frequently linked with socialism and humanist social reform, treating architecture as a tool for improving everyday living conditions in the aftermath of the war. Architects and critics have long disputed exactly what functionalism requires in practice, and the term remains, by its own account, a matter of continuing confusion and controversy within the profession.