Tallinn, Estonia doesn’t have nearly as many Art Nouveau buildings as fellow Baltic capital Riga, Latvia—it wasn’t having the same kind of explosive growth in the period at the border of the 19th and 20th centuries and therefore not as many new buildings of any kind.
But the ones it has are pretty spectacular, such as the one above built in 1910 at 18 Pikk Street, in the heart of Tallinn’s medieval walled city. It was designed by architect Jacques Rosenbaum, the main Estonian Art Nouveau practitioner, with sculpture by August Volz.
It would be easier for me to enjoy Rosenbaum’s work if I hadn’t also learned that after emigrating to Germany in 1928, he and his wife became enthusiastic members of the Nazi Party. Rosenbaum spent the 1930s working for the Luftwaffe and was later an advisor in occupied Riga for Hitler’s Organization Todt, which was responsible for designing and building concentration camps and other projects with forced labor.
I just love Art Nouveau and Art Deco. I believe the use of these styles died out because of the cost and then replaced by new styles. I remain optimistic that many of these buildings become historically preserved.