Berthold Romanovich Lubetkin [commonly known as Berthold Lubetkin] was born in Tbilisi, Russia Empire [now Georgia] on 14 December 1901*. From 1920 to 1922 he studied under Alexander Rodchenko and Vladimir Tatlin at the VKhUTEMAS in Moscow and the SVOMAS in Petrograd. He then attended the Bauschule at the Technische Hochschule and the Höhere Fachschule für Textil und Bekleidungsindustrie in Berlin in 1922-23; Warsaw Polytechnic School of Architecture from 1923 to 1925; the École Speciale d'Architecture in Paris in 1925; at the Atelier Auguste Perret and at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris in 1926-27; the École Supérieur de Béton Armé in Paris in 1927; and the Institut d'Urbanisme, Sorbonne in Paris from 1927 to 1929.
Lubetkin began to practice as an architect in Paris in the mid-1920s. Projects from this period included the conversion of a warehouse as the Club Trepèze Volant on Rue de Volontaires in Paris (1927-28); and, with Jean Ginsberg, apartments on the Avenue de Versailles in Paris (1928-31).
In 1931 Lubetkin emigrated to the UK and settled in London. Very soon after his arrival in London he rounded up a group of six like-minded recent graduates of the Architectural Association School: Godfrey Samuel (1904-1982), Valentine (Val) Harding (1905-1940), Michael Dugdale (1905-1970), Anthony Merlott Chitty (1907-1976), Francis Skinner (1908-1998.) and Lindsay Drake (1909-1980) and formed Tecton (or TECTON Architects) a London-based architectural partnership. In 1935 Samuel and Harding left the partnership to form their own firm, and Chitty and Dugdale also left. In 1937 Denys Lasdun joined the practice and later became a partner. Although Tecton was supposedly run on democratic lines, because of his age and experience and his charismatic personality, Lubetkin was to dominate the partnership.
Projects by Tecton included several buildings for London Zoo, including the Gorilla House, the Penguin Pool, a refreshment bar and the Elephant House (1932-37), two houses at Whipsnade Zoo in Bedfordshire (1933-36), High Point I and II Flats in Highgate, London (1933-35, 1936-38), buildings for Dudley Zoo in Dudley, Worcestershire (1936-37), Finsbury Health Centre in Finsbury, London (1938) and the Spa Green housing estate in Finsbury, London (mid-1940s). Between 1937-39, Tecton developed an Air Raid Shelter Plan for Finsbury which was published as 'Planned A.R.P. Based on the investigation of structural protection against air attack in the Metropolitan Borough of Finsbury' by TECTON Architects (London: The Architectural Press, 1939).
Tecton was dissolved in 1947 and the following year Lubetkin joined Francis Skinner and Douglas Bailey in a new partnership - Skinner, Bailey & Lubetkin.
During the early 1930s Lubetkin was also in partnership with Ammon Vivien Pilichowski (1907-1982) as B. Lubetkin & A. V. Pilichowski. A house they designed in Plumstead, London in 1934 is discussed in The Book of the Modern House, edited by Patrick Aberrcrombie (1939 pp. 68-69).
Lubetkin retired from architectural practice in 1952 and from 1952 to 1959 farmed in Upper Kilcott, Gloucestershire. In 1969 he abandoned farming and moved to Clifton, Bristol.
Lubetkin was a founder-member of the MARS. Modern Architectural Research Group. He was awarded the RIBA Royal Gold Medal in 1982. He became a naturalised British Citizen in 1939. He died in Bristol, England on 23 October 1990.
* "A different place and year of birth—Warsaw, 1903—are noted in several student certificates and in Lubetkin's British passport: these were explained by Lubetkin himself as false information to eliminate an early period of cadet service with the Red Army about 1919–20. An authenticated birth certificate has not been traced" [John Allan. Berthold Romanovich Lubetkin. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]
Allen, John. ‘Berthold Lubekin’. Architectural Review vol. 234, no. 1399, September 2013, pp. 108-109.
Allan, John. Berthold Lubetkin: Architecture and the Tradition of Progress. London: Artifice 2nd edition, 2012
Allen, John. ‘Berthold Lubetkin: pioneer modernist’. RIBA Journal vol. 97, no. 12, December 1990 pp.30-32
Allan, John. ‘Rediscovering Lubetkin’ in British Architecture and Design in the 1930s. Edited Suannah Charlton, Elain Harwood and Alan Powers. The Journal of the Twentieth Century Society, no. 8, 2007 pp.80-88
Allen, John and Moro, Peter. ‘Obituary. Berthold Lubetkin 1901-1990’. Architectural Review vol. 188, no. 1126, Dece,ber 1990 pp. 4, 8, 10.
Allen, John et al. ‘Berthold Lubetkin; The passing of a modern master; A Tolek to the nation’. Architects’ Journal vol. 192, no. 18, 31 October 1990 pp. 5, 13, 17.
‘Analysis of a building: Flats at Northfield, Highgate’. Architects’ Journal 17 January 1935 pp. 113-119 [Architects: Lubetkin and Tecton]
Benton, Tim. ‘Berthold Lubetkin e il sogno del modernismo’. Casabella. vol. 57, no. 601, June 1993, pp. 46-51, 70-71.
Berthold Lubetkin : un moderne en Angleterre. Liege : Mardaga, 1983.
‘Berthold Lubetkin - winner of 1982 RIBA Gold Medal for Architecture.’ Architect and Surveyor vol. 57, no. 2, April/May 1982 pp. 16-17.
Butler, David. ‘Dudley Zoo: a monument to 30s modernism’. RIBA Journal vol. 89, no. 6, June 1982 pp. 46-47.
Coe, Peter. ‘Lubetkin and Tecton’. Royal Institute of British Architects. Transactions vol. 1, no. 2, 1982, p. 50-56.
Coe, Peter. Lubetkin and Tecton : architecture and social commitment : a critical study. London : Arts Council, 1981.
Curtis, William J. R. Berthold Lubetkin. In Contemporary Architects. London and Chicago: St. James Press, 2nd edition1987 pp. 543-544 [Contains an extensive bibliography]
Curtis, William. ‘Berthold Lubetkin, or, 'Socialist' architecture in the Diaspora.’ AAQ vol. 8, no. 3, 1976, pp. 33-39.
Diehl, Thomas. ‘Theory and Principle: Berthold Lubetkin's Highpoint One and Highpoint Two’, Journal of Architectural Education vol. 52, no.4, May 1999 pp. 233-241
‘Gold medal awarded to Lubetkin’. RIBA Journal vol. 89, no. 3, March 1982 p. 6
Gould, Polly. ‘Revisit: Penguin Pool; Architects: Berthold Lubetkin with engineer Ove Arup, 1933-1934’. Architectural Review February 2022 pp. 64-70
Harwood, Elain. Mid-Century Britain: Modern Architecture 1938-1963. London: Batsford, 2021
Harwood, Elain. Space Hope and Brutalism. English Architecture 1945-1975. New Haven, Connecticut and London: Yale University Press in association with Historic England for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 2015
Hatherley, Owen. ‘Lubetkin in Russia’. Architectural Review vol. 238, no, 1412, October 2014 pp. 116-117
Hicks, Stuart. ‘Conserving Tecton structures at Dudley Zoo.’ Context no. 142, November 2015, pp. 27-28. [Designed by Lubetkin and Tecton]
Jordon, Robert Furneaux. 'Lubetkin'. Architectural Review vol. 118, July 1955 pp. 36-44 [Discusses the major projects by Berthold Lubetkin and Tecton]
Kehoe, Louise. In this Dark House: a Memoir. London: Viking, revised edition, 1996
Kinoshita, Toshiko and Watanabe, Kenji. ‘English modern houses in the 30's. 1. Introduction - the beginning of a new tradition. Highpoint I & II by Berthold Lubetkin, 1933-38.’ A&U no. 7, July 1997 pp. 138-143
Lambert, Sam. 'Historic pioneers: architects and clients'. Architects' Journal vol. vo. 151, 11 March 1970 pp. 594-597 [Regent's Park Zoo in London designed by Lubetkin and Tecton is discussed]
Lewittes, Deborah. Berthold Lubetkin's Highpoint II and the Jewish contribution to modern English architecture. London: Routledge 2018
‘Lubetkin dies’. Building vol. 255, no. 7670, 25 October 1990 p. 9
Lubetkin, Berthold. ‘Lubetkin: the untold story’. World Architecture no. 24, 1993 pp. 64-77 [Extract from Lubetkin’s unpublished memoir]
Lyall, Sutherland. ‘Thoroughly modern architect’. New Society vol. 59, no. 1000, 14 January 1982 pp. 63-64. [Berthold Lubetkin, the subject of a current touring exhibition]
Macdonald, Susan. ‘Long Live modern Architecture. A technical appraisal of three 1930s houses’. Twentieth Century Architecture. The Journal of the Twentieth Century Society [The Modern House Revisited special issue] no.2, 1996 pp. 102-110 [Discusses Bungalow ‘A’ adjoining Wipsnade Zoo in Dagnall Buckinghamshire, designed by Berthold Lubetkin in 1933-36]
Mallows, Wilfred ‘Lubetkin and Tecton in the 1930s’. Architecture SA nos. 5/6, 1987, pp. 28-30.
Morrissey, Richard. Berthold Lubetkin and the influence of the Russian avant-garde on the landscape of Britain. M.A. thesis, University of London (Courtauld Institute of Art), 2019
Nelson, George. 'Architects of Europe today, 12: Tecton'. Pencil Points vol. 17, October 1936 pp. 528-540 [Focuses on three projects by Lubetkin and Tecton - Highgate Flats in London, Regent's Park Zoo, and Whipsnade Zoo]
Pawley, Martin. ‘Thoughts on the passing of Berthold Lubetkin’. Building vol. 255, no. 7671, 2 1990 pp. 28-29.
Powers, Alan. Modern. The Modern Movement in Britain. London: Merrell, 2005
Rambert, Francis. ‘Berthold Lubetkin: a Georgian in the English countryside’. Architectes no. 140, August/September 1983 pp. 10-13
Reading, Malcolm and Coe, Peter. Lubetkin & Tecton : an architectural study. London: Triangle Architectural Pub. 1992
Sambrook, Justine. ‘Parting shot. Sunnywood, Haywards Heath, 1936’. RIBA Journal vol. 126, no. 11, November 2019 p. 130 [Architects: Berthold Lubetkin and Tecton]
Selley, Celia. 'Lubetkin in Clerkenwell'. C20. The Magazine of the Twentieth Century Society, issue 2, 2021 pp. 74-75
Service, Alastair. The Architects of London and their buildings from 1066 to the present. London: The Architectural Press, 1979
Sharp, Denis. ‘The last link: Berthold Lubetkin, 1901-1990’. A&U no. 2, February 1991 pp. 3-5
Sharp, Denis. ‘Reflecting Lubetkin’. Building vol. 242, no. 7247 25 June 1982 pp. 36-39.
Tappin, Stuart and Platts, David. ‘Conservation of Tecton buildings at Dudley Zoo, West Midlands’. Association for Studies in the Conservation of Historic Buildings. Transactions vol. 38, 2015, p. 12-28. [Designed by Lubetkin and Tecton]
Thirties: British Art and Design before the War. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1979 [Catalogue of an exhibition at the Hayward Gallery, London, 25 October-13 January 1979]
Thomas, John. ‘Dudley Zoo - a retrospect; Architects: Berthold Lubetkin, of Tecton’. Architecture West Midlands no. 32, December 1977 pp. 9-10
Working-Class Residential Flats in Reinforced Concrete : report on a competition for designs of blocks of working-class residential flats in reinforced concrete : organised by the Cement Marketing Company Limited. Introduction by P. Morton Shand. London: Cement Marketing Company, 1935 [Report on a competition organised by the Cement Marketing Company. The winner was Lubetkin and Tecton, in partnership with the civil engineer, Ove Arup.]