The materialization of an architectural dream. Henry Van de Velde’s projects for the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller

Henry van de Velde is one of the most multifaceted architects in the history of architecture in the last century, both in terms of his work and the versatility of the strategies he employed throughout his career. The Belgian architect immersed to a multitude of artistic disciplines, allowing himself to be influenced by the ideas of William Morris’s Arts & Crafts, linking himself to the beginnings of Art Nouveau or becoming involved in the Deutscher Werkbund until 1914. The development of this multidisciplinary attitude, a symptom of his creative evolution, experienced one of its most intense episodes during his working relationship with the Kröller-Müller couple of modern art collectors in the Netherlands. This research unravels Henry van de Velde’s graphic and architectural legacy in the service of the Kröller-Müller family, from the first sketches in the 1920s to the execution of the museum in 1936-57. A true example of the realisation of an architectural dream.