Wilhelm Büning (1881–1958 · architect)

Büning was born into a textile manufacturing family in Borken, Westphalia, in 1881. He studied architecture at technical universities in Munich, Dresden and Berlin-Charlottenburg. In 1909, he founded his own architecture practice in the German capital. Büning rose to prominence as an architect and university lecturer. As the latter, he believed that talented students should be allowed to study without first obtaining their school-leaving certificate. He also pushed for craftsmanship skills to be united in the execution of architecture and construction, disciplines that Büning believed constitute the true quality of the building trade. In 1928, he published his Bauanatomie (The Anatomics of Building), a standard work on the subject in which he opposed a one-sided focus on style matters.