Quick Facts
Biography
Ludwig Levy (born 18 April 1854; died 30 November 1907) was a German Jewish architect of the Historicist school. He designed a number of synagogues, among which the huge Neue Synagoge in Strasbourg, as well as official buildings such as the ministries of Alsace-Lorraine on the Kaiserplatz in that same town.
Life and work
Levy was born in Landau, Palatinate (then belonging to the Kingdom of Bavaria), the sixth child of Jonas Levy, a textile trader from Herxheim, and Barbara Levy, née Machhol, from Edesheim. His older brother Heinrich was a district engineer in Landau. Attracted towards the same profession, Levy started studying mathematics and engineering in Karlsruhe in 1870, to the displeasure of his father who had wished for him to study medicine instead.
After obtaining his degree in engineering in 1875 at the Polytechnical school of Karlsruhe, Levy took classes in architecture in the same school for one year. Between 1876 and 1881, he trained with architects in Mainz and Frankfurt, before leaving for a ten-month journey of architectural studies through Italy. Back in Frankfurt in 1882, he became an assistant to Paul Wallot, the architect of the Reichstag. He moved to Kaiserslautern later the same year, where he lived and worked as an independent architect until 1886.
In 1886, Ludwig Levy was named a professor at the Baugewerkeschule in Karlsruhe. He would remain in that town until his premature death from a heart attack at the age of 53. Levy married in 1890 and had two children, a daughter, born 1891, and a son, born 1896. His widow Flora Levy, née Levinger, died in the Theresienstadt concentration camp on 23 April 1943, aged 74. By this time, both their children had been dead as well, leaving no descendants.
From 1902 until his death, in addition to his post as a professor, Levy held the positions of Bautechnischer Referent and Baurat in the Ministry of the Interior of the Grand Duchy of Baden.
During his career, Levy designed a number of grand synagogues in Strasbourg, Kaiserslautern, Pforzheim, Rostock, Barmen, Bingen, Baden-Baden, Luxembourg City, and many other places. Almost all of these have been destroyed by the Nazis during and after "Kristallnacht". Most of the villas, churches and administrative buildings designed by Levy have survived, such as the church in Olsbrücken, the villa Böhm in Neustadt an der Weinstraße, etc. The protestant church of Bexbach (1888–1889) is today colloquially known as the "Levy-Kirche".