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"The city of Graz, Austria contains excellent examples of modernist and internationalist architecture that complements its perfectly-preserved Baroque and medieval structures. The New Graz Architecture is characterized by an emphasis on function as related to the environment.
Its aesthetic may have been guided by existence of the artistic organization Forum Stadtpark, the presence of architectural school at the Technical University of Graz and the management of regional architect Wolfdieter Dreibholz.
The well-preserved old centre of Austria's second city is complemented by a wide range of architectural tendencies that can range from the expressionist to the minimalist, yet maintain a strong historical relation by distinctive contrast.
Graz is the second city of Austria, and the regional capital of Styria, the third largest of the nine Austrian Lander.(1) With a mere 250 000 inhabitants, it is five times larger than any other city in mainly mountainous Styria (Steiermark). It was founded in the twelfth century when Styria became a self-governing Dukedom under the Emperor, and it was for periods in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the imperial residence and capital of Inner Austria. It has always been an administrative centre and a market. It has also been the regional legal centre, a bishopric, and a centre of learning with a long-standing university and various Hochschulen.
Communications from the north were difficult until the opening of the Vienna-Trieste railway in 1856, but Graz has long been an important cross-roads of Southern Europe : with the Hungarian border 45 miles to the east, it is an important east-west link, and with the Slovenian border only 25 miles south, it is also the gate to the Balkans. Industrialisation came late, but the region has the best reserves of coal and iron in Austria. Now half the working population is in local industries.
The presence in the region of leading specialist firms for steel, glass, aluminium and other building materials has been important for the development of innovative details in recent Graz architecture........"
From: The Architectural Review | Date: 10/1/1995 | Author: Jones, Peter Blundell -
New Graz architecture. (Austria) - The Architectural Review | Encyclopedia.com