Degania & Nahalal

Description

These two settlements represent the establishment of the first kibbutz and moshav with designs and physical form representing the ideological-social patterns of the late 19th and early 20th century. These patterns are a direct result of ideas prepared since Utopia written by Thomas Moore written in 1516. Degania The kibbutz movement is one of the modern manifestations of socialist thinking of the past 200 years, developed in the work of Marx and Engel in The Communist Manifesto of 1848. The original buildings of the kibbutz date from 1910 and were planned in an egalitarian layout, and buildings around a central courtyard including the dining room, showers and work spaces. Being a farming community the landmark elements included the water tower and the grain silo. The public buildings, including the childrens' house, kindergarten and school, which was designed by Richard Kaufman helped to explain the social dilemmas of education in the kibbutz. Nahalal The moshav represents a form of cooperative settlement whereby the individual manages his own farm while the public facilities are shared. This developed a unique form by Architect Richard Kaufman in 1921. This design takes the form of a wheel where the hub contains the main community buildings and the spokes are the farming units. These forms found their history in idealistic concepts as presented by Ebenezer Howard and as found in other indigenous farming and fishing villages around the world. Examples like Mexcaltitan, Palmanova or Pbilippeville, Hamina, Karlsruhe show similar patterns developed at Nahalal.