Page 24 - The Architecture of Nadler-Nadler-Bixon-Gil

mostly admired Le Corbusier’s early works, following the
shifts in his work during and after World War II as they
were happening.

In 1945 Shulamit (then 22) and Michael (then 24)
were qualified as architects. Their class was the Technion's
18th, training one of the first "post-independence"
generations of students in the Building and Architecture
Departments between the mid-1940s and mid-1950. Most
of the graduates were native Israelis; some had fought
in the 1948 War of Independence. This generation was
active in changing the guard in Eretz Israel architecture
with the establishment of the State, replacing many of
the central architects active prior to that, who were mostly
immigrants who had learned their profession in their
countries of origin. Upon graduation Michael left Kibbutz
Yagur and moved with Shulamit to Tel Aviv. Refraining
from the traditional training period in established
architecture firms, they opened their first office at the
house of Shulamit’s parents in Nordia.

“It was daunting,” says Shulamit, recalling the
initial stages of their independent career, when they were
planning small buildings and homes for private clients.
“We had no common language with the clients, and knew
it was going to fail. Very quickly we understood that the
only way to significant building was through participation
in design competitions.” Between the 1940s and 1960s,
the period in which Nadler-Nadler-Bixon-Gil formed, most
of the public buildings in the country were commissioned
through public competitions held on a monthly basis and
set according to strict standards established by the
professional competition committee of the Israeli union
of engineers and architects.

In 1946 Shulamit and Michael Nadler won their
first public competition – for planning the Ruppin College
of Agriculture (today Ruppin Academic Center) in Emek
Hefer [pp. 50-64]. Following their win they began a detailed
plan of the college, which was inaugurated less than three
years later, at the beginning of 1949. Initially the clients
had wanted the two architects, who were in their mid-
twenties, to team up with an established architect, and
they agreed provided the partner was an engineer, not

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