So, I've noticed for quite a while now that many famous buildings of the elite were constructed at the turn of the twentieth century when a collection of famous architects were involved with the Theosophical Society. This also applies to artists, sculptors, doctors and scientists. And on looking through the biographies of these famous people this is a factor that is often left out. This is an introductory post to the (very vast) topic which combines the arts, science and esoterica.

This is one of the few essays I have found on the subject of architecture. Theosophy and Architecture (part 1) and Theosophy and Architecture (part 2)

The building of the Nederlandsche Handel-Maatschappij (Dutch Trade Company) (1919-1926) is a long-time favourite of mine. When I started my PhD research on Theosophy and Art in the Netherlands in 1987, I came across this building in the literature on Karel de Bazel (1869-1923, a Theosophical architect and designer whose most famous work is the subject of this article). I was struck by the peculiarity of it, not only by itself but also with the vision and total work of the architect. It is curiously un-Western in appearance, a pleasure to the eye because of its fine sculpturing, but monolithic in appearance and emphatically turned inward. I was sure from the start that there was more to this building than the literature suggested.

It should be stated here that my explanation of the possible Theosophical symbolism of the building is based partly on existing literature, partly on circumstantial evidence and partly on hypothesis, as the actual research on the building is yet to take place. My hypothesis is based on my long-time experience as a researcher into the way a Theosophical artist views life on earth and expresses this through art. This way of thinking does not create a direct line from A to B. As we shall see it will have turns and hooks but that does not mean it is less coherent than a traditional Western, non-esoteric architectural theory.

The remarkable ‘De Bazel-style’ can still be seen in his first design of the Dutch Trading Company of 1917-18 (fig. 1). This design, however, was rejected by the Board of Directors. It is said that they wanted more floors for future expansion. But the second design of 1919, which incorporates the necessary extra floors, does not differ in this practical aspect alone. It also differs aesthetically. In the first design the façade was flat, severe, serene and classical; superficially it resembled the seventeenth century palace on Dam Square by Jacob van Campen. Its seventeenth-century outlook would have fitted nicely into the atmosphere of the buildings along the canals in the immediate surroundings. The second design is the opposite of the first in many respects: it is capricious, obtrusive and basically Eastern. It is a combination of Assyrian architecture and a Hindu temple.

Cern's Shiva and the Dance of Destruction; Sanskrit & Artificial Intelligence — NASA Knowledge Representation in Sanskrit and Artificial Intelligence ; MIT's Masters Program in Sanskrit

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TCI was solely responsible for the unloading, just before the Crisis hit, of all ABN AMRO's derivative losses on Fortis, Santander and RBS, all of which had to be saved to the tune of hundreds of billions of British, Spanish, Belgian and Dutch taxpayers' money.

continuing with the article...

Completely in line with modern Theosophy, Lauweriks’ design is a combination of Eastern and Western design principles (fig. 2). The justification of the design is closely modelled on Sanskrit texts: it has forty slokas (stanzas in Sanskrit holy books). Lauweriks used mostly Sanskrit sources – he knew Sanskrit fluently – to justify his choice for the leading design principle, which is Kundalini-shakti, which is the cosmic power inherent to all matter.

In human beings, kundalini is symbolically expressed as a snake that rests in the hollow of the tailbone of the spine and that can be activated by chanting certain slokas during yoga meditation. It then unfolds and travels up the spine, activating chakras along the way, thus producing different stages of cosmic energy and consciousness. It is also represented by the caduceus, a rod with wings, on either side of which two snakes entwine upwards. Westerners know the caduceus mainly as a medical symbol.

...In Eastern -- and especially in the Hindu and Buddhist -- architecture the line as a structural, form-giving element is of extreme importance. A world-famous example, which was cherished by Dutch Theosophists because it stood on colonial lands in the Dutch East-Indies, is the Buddhist temple Borobudur in Java. Both the ground plan and the elevation of the temple are determined by the meandering line, which has its parallel in meditation diagrams.

In the book The Defining Years of the Dutch East Indies, 1942-1949: Survivors' Accounts.. : A group from our school went to the majestic eighth century Buddhist stupa, the Borobudur, located in Central Java. I had to beg my mother to let me go.We went under military escort! On August 17, 1945, the Dutch red, white, and blue was lowered and the Indonesian red and white was hoisted. I did not realize then that a new nation, a new republic, was just born, and I was there! source

In part 2, the author breaks down the architectural interpretation of Theosophical concepts of chaos, fine matter and the immaterial (glass and light) :

Finally I want to examine the glass roof above the two central courts, the main halls on the ground floor. As De Bazel designed it, through the glass roof daylight was to reach the ground floor unhindered. Apart from the fact that this construction served functionally as a light source within the building, the glass roof must also have had a specific meaning, if we look at it from De Bazel’s own frame of mind. At the time of completion of the building – hence before the floors were removed during renovation in the 1970’s and thus lost forever – light struck directly upon the meandering floor, activating the intersecting and superimposed lines with energy in form and colour and, so to speak, ‘bringing them to life’.

This remarkable element, taken from religious architecture, cannot but symbolize how Light – astral light, in the cosmic sense – brings life to matter. Theosophists believe that astral light shoots itself downwards into inert matter and thus imbues it with the spark of life. Astral light thus charges matter with energy and forces it to develop. The roof therefore symbolizes the highest plane of evolution, Spirit.

Hillary Clinton on glass ceilings in 2008 and 2016 ; Hillary Clinton shatters glass & gives remarks to Democratic National Convention

The article does not discuss the concept of space, which Frank Lloyd Wright (another Theosophist) used in his design for the Unity Temple : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unity_Temple

The design of Unity Temple represents a leap forward in design for Wright. In recounting his experiences with Unity Temple, he stated that this design was the first time he ever realized that the real heart of a building is its space, not its walls. Indeed, architectural historians have commented on Wright's genius in creating and manipulating space in his designs; in his book The Master Builders, Peter Blake entitled the section on Wright "The Mastery of Space."

Related: Data dump and some speculations on Art Brut and Brutalism Architecture- From Podesta to CEMEX

To be continued...