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The design
Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich designed it for the Tugendhats
The villa was designed by the German architects Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich. It was built between 1928 and 1930 for Fritz Tugendhat and his wife Greta, and is a pioneering prototype of modern architecture in Europe.
The frame
An iron frame freed the walls, and two windows sink into the floor
Mies used an iron framework, which let him dispense with supporting walls. The main living area has a curtain wall of large windows framing a view of Špilberk Castle, and two of them can be lowered into the floor.
Onyx
A wall of onyx from the Atlas Mountains divides the living area
The dividing wall is brown-gold onyx, which Mies sourced from the Atlas Mountains in Morocco. He supervised the cutting and finishing himself. The wall is partially translucent and changes appearance when the evening sun is low.
1992
The split of Czechoslovakia was signed in the villa in 1992
On 26 August 1992, Václav Klaus and Vladimír Mečiar, the political leaders of Czechoslovakia, met in the villa. They signed the document that divided the country into the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic. Since 1994 it has been open as a museum.
Leaving
The family lived in the villa for just eight years
Fritz and Greta Tugendhat lived in the villa for just eight years. Persecution of the Jewish people forced the family to flee Czechoslovakia in 1938. The Gestapo confiscated the villa in 1939 and used it as an apartment and office.
Day 2, morning
Next is Capuchin Crypt.
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The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Villa Tugendhat, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.