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It is not much more than a week since Christmas Day but how many of those toys that you bought and were received with so much joy are still being used?

Or did you get the latest piece of technology as your Christmas present - to replace the almost identical one that you got last year?

Why is almost everything these days so short-lived?

One of the best-selling toys this Christmas was the Hatchimal, just £59.99 for a cuddly toy that you have to encourage to hatch from its own plastic egg. Call me a cynic but I don't see that being the centre of many kids' world throughout all of 2017.

Of course, if you are willing to spend that kind of money to give your children just what they want for Christmas, fair enough, but for environmental experts the real cost is more significant.

Such toys are often very hard to recycle, and a lot could be done to change that, says Margaret Bates, professor of sustainable waste management at Northampton University.

"Eighty per cent of waste is generated at the design stage, so if we can start thinking of the end of life when we are designing things we will get a much better recovery rate," she says.

"Just even using fewer screws or making sure that you keep materials separate, so that you can use plastic and metal but not stick them together."

The technology even exists to go much further, adds Prof Bates: "There are also some clever things that you can do like putting things in the microwave or expose them to a special light source and all the fixtures and fittings will snap off, they just fall apart."

That, of course, makes recycling much easier.

The trouble is, not many toys or presents are designed that way, even some wrapping paper is not recyclable.

The trend away from repairing, recycling or reusing seems to be getting worse but it has been going on for years, according to Deyan Sudjic, director of the Design Museum in London.

"Ever since the 1920s and an American advertising man called Elmo Calkins, who suggested it was the duty of the consumer to use stuff up to get us out of the [Great] Depression, there has been the concept of built-in obsolescence," he says.

And that obsolescence is getting more and more built in. Some new games consoles won't work with the games people already own. Or, take the smartphone - it has replaced many products like the camera, typewriter and Dictaphone.

But those items could last for decades. Some were even passed down from one generation to the next. Now, however, people replace their phones when one part breaks or a new model is released.

You can even see this on the High Street. TV and radio repair shops are a vanishing breed. Lawnmower maintenance ones are even rarer and camera shops are in serious decline.

But there is an exception that proves the rule - the explosion in the number of bicycle repair shops.

The reason is simple enough to understand: we are cycling more and the technology is pretty much the same as it has always been.

John Gallen should know - he repairs bikes at Cycle Surgery in central London. "Materials have changed. There are steel, carbon, aluminium, even bamboo bikes out there, but ultimately it is still the triangular frame, two wheels, handlebars and a set of pedals and off you go," he tells me.

But even that may be about to change with the new popularity of electric bikes. "We are moving down that road," says John. "The electric bikes are making their way into the market and with them you just plug the bike in to get the diagnostics."

It is possible to design and make things that last a long time, can be repaired or upgraded and then, finally, almost totally recycled, but that doesn't seem to be happening yet.

But it may be coming sooner than current trends suggest. Modern technology from toys to mobile phones and electric bikes is dependent on increasingly rare metals.

As Prof Bates explains: "There are limited amounts of those metals left, so we have to be much cleverer about how we keep them or we could be in danger of going back to the days when only very rich people had hi-tech goods, because it is so expensive to buy as those materials aren't out there."

Although you will, of course, always be able to get on your bike, so long as it is not electric. Perhaps one made from bamboo should be on your list for Santa next year?
You can hear Jonty Bloom's report on the PM programme on Tuesday, 3 January.

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It is not much more than a week since Christmas Day but how many of those toys that you bought and were received with so much joy are still being used? Or did you get the latest piece of technology as your Christmas present - to replace the almost identical one that you got last year?

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The School of Design in Dessau

Dessau is the city most closely associated with the Bauhaus. This is where the school of design founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar in 1919 was active for the longest period of time, and where it experienced its heyday from 1925 to 1932. All three directors of the Bauhaus - Walter Gropius, Hannes Meyer und Ludwig Mies van der Rohe - left their mark on the Bauhaus Dessau, and almost all of the Bauhaus buildings erected in Dessau are now regarded as icons of twentieth century architecture.

The Bauhaus and the city

In Dessau the Bauhaus was able to directly realise its desire to play a part in shaping modern society. Dessau in the 1920s is an up-and-coming industrial location, with Lord Mayor Fritz Hesse, engineer Hugo Junkers and state-appointed conservator Ludwig Grote as its driving forces. In 1924, when the Bauhaus was compelled to leave Weimar for political reasons, other cities such as Frankfurt am Main, Darmstadt and Magdeburg competed to host the Bauhaus school. Dessau then emerged victorious.

The school of design, designed by Walter Gropius and financed by the city, opened in 1926. Some 1,500 guests from all over the world arrived in Dessau for the inauguration.

Bauhausgebäude Dessau, Ansicht von Südost, Fotografie, Fotograf unbekannt (vermutlich Ernst Gülzow), o. J., 1931/32,unbezeichnet, Vintage Print, 5,4 x 8,6 cm /

Bauhaus Dessau, Nach dem Unterricht bei Wassily Kandinsky (in der Mitte sitzend) im Prellerhaus, Fotografie, Fotograf unbekannt, o. J., 1931/32,unbezeichnet, Vintage Print, 5,6 x 8 cm /

Beginn einer Reise von Studenten der Architektur-Abteilung vor dem Bauhausgebäude Dessau, 1932 /

Studenten auf der Brüstung der Mensa-Terrasse um 1931 /

Shaping the modern age

The catastrophic experiences of WWI motivated the Bauhauslers to radically rethink life, society and the everyday world. Rejecting traditional knowledge, with the Bauhaus they forged a school of design in which young people were to develop their artistic creativity by learning with and from materials so that they could give shape to the modern age and meet its many demands. In doing so, the focus was less on the individual work of art than on everyday objects which were to be manufactured in collaboration with industry. Out of this emerged the lion's share of the best-known products and buildings that continue to influence the image of the Bauhaus today, from Marcel Breuer's tubular steel furniture to Marianne Brandt's ashtray, from the Stahlhaus (Steel House) to the school's best-selling product, the Bauhaus wallpaper.

The Bauhaus as a locus for the avant-garde

In just a few years the Bauhaus Dessau becomes a focus of attention for young people from all over the world. The theoretical instruction is placed on a broader footing and other subjects, e.g. engineering sciences, psychology or business studies are incorporated in the syllabus. Graduates now completed their training with a Bauhaus Diploma. In the workshop wing of the school building the machines clattered while in the stage workshop, modern theatre evolved. The students lived in the studio building, also known as the Prellerhaus, and met in the canteen or used the gymnasium. The masters however lived with their families close by in the Masters' Houses. The first generation of masters were Walter Gropius, Oskar Schlemmer, Georg Muche, László Moholy-Nagy, Lyonel Feininger, Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee. These were often joined by friends and guests with the result that the complex of Masters' Houses came to epitomise the artists' colony of the twentieth century.

The city as contractor

The city of Dessau entrusted the Bauhaus with several public construction projects. The Dessau-Törten Housing Estate and the Employment Office by Walter Gropius, the Houses with Balcony Access by Hannes Meyer and the Kornhaus restaurant by Carl Fieger all come about in this way. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe built the small Kiosk near the Masters' Houses.

The three directors and the school's closure

In Dessau, too, the Bauhaus was not immune from political hostilities. After Walter Gropius transfers his leadership of the school to Hannes Meyer in 1928, the latter places an ever-increasing focus on the social aims of the Bauhaus, being primarily concerned with the question of how well designed products and buildings might be made affordable for all.

The Volkswohnung (people's flat), the Houses with Balcony Access and the ADGB Trade Union School in Bernau stood out as architectonic examples of Meyer's idea of collective design with a social ideal. The students under Meyer became politically radicalised and involved with communism. As a result, politicians dismissed Hannes Meyer, who was himself a Marxist, in 1930. The third Bauhaus director, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, was personally recommended by Walter Gropius. Under van der Rohe the preliminary course was scrapped and the activities of the workshops downscaled. Architecture, constructive logic and free-flowing open space came into focus.

In the municipal assembly of Dessau meanwhile, the National Socialists had obtained a majority. On 30 September 1932 the assembly resolved to close the Bauhaus Dessau. Van der Rohe directed the Bauhaus as a private institute in Berlin-Steglitz for one more term, but after numerous disputes with the National Socialists he announced the dissolution of the Bauhaus in a newsletter on 10 August 1933.

The reception of the Bauhaus idea worldwide

Despite the closure of the school the ideas of the Bauhaus spread worldwide. Many of the Bauhaus masters went into exile and became professors at successor institutions, for instance Josef Albers at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, or László Moholy-Nagy, who directed the New Bauhaus in Chicago. The students who arrived at the Bauhaus Dessau from 29 different countries also disseminated the Bauhaus ideas in their homelands.

The preservation of the Bauhaus legacy in Dessau

The Bauhaus architecture was able to survive National Socialism, WWII and the GDR era largely intact, although some buildings were damaged. The GDR first rediscovers the Bauhaus legacy in 1976. It reconstructs the Bauhaus Building in line with monument conservation guidelines and establishes the Wissenschaftlich-Kulturelle Zentrum (WKZ), which among other things starts to build up the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation's current collection and reactivates the Bauhaus stage. The Bauhaus Dessau Foundation is established after reunification in 1994. To this day this researches, conserves and passes on the Bauhaus legacy in the form of the buildings, the collection and the variety of themes spanning architecture, design and art. The Foundation has an artistic-scientific mission; its institutional sponsors are the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM), the federal state of Saxony-Anhalt and the city of Dessau-Roßlau.

The Bauhaus and its Sites in Weimar and Dessau have been included on the UNESCO World Heritage list since 1996.

Every year some 100,000 visitors from all over the world come to Dessau to view the Bauhaus buildings and to research, work and become creatively involved as scientists, architects, designers, artists or students.

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Dessau is the city most closely associated with the Bauhaus. This is where the school of design founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar in 1919 was active for the longest period of time, and where it experienced its heyday from 1925 to 1932.

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Thomas Heatherwick: Building the Seed Cathedral

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A future more beautiful? Architect Thomas Heatherwick shows five recent projects featuring ingenious bio-inspired designs. Some are remakes of the ordinary: a bus, a bridge, a power station ... And one is an extraordinary pavilion, the Seed Cathedral, a celebration of growth and light.

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After sharing a pair of modern icons, the Wagenfeld Lamp and Thonet No 14 chair, one would be hard-pressed to overestimate the importance of the Wassily Chair, which evolved as a symbol of modernism and remains among the most famous of the Bauhaus chairs.

Originally, the Wassily Chair was designed by Marcel Breuer in 1925, while he was an apprentice at the Bauhaus in Dessau. Before we focus on this very special piece of furniture, let's take a look at the designer himself.

Marcel Breuer

Marcel Breuer (1902- 1981) was born in Hungary and later studied and taught at the Bauhaus in Dessau. There, he became one of the very first designers who would create furniture with tubular steel. Apparently, the elegantly curved tubular steel handlebars of his Adler bicycle inspired him to work with this material. The process of manufacturing seamless, tubular steel had just been invented by the German steel manufacturer Mannesmann.

For the auditorium in Dessau, Breuer developed a number of different pieces of furniture, all of which were lightweight, affordable and hygienic. At that time, this was absolutely revolutionary for a number of reasons. It used new materials like leather or bent steel, and most importantly, it looked absolutely different than anything else that had ever been designed before. As such, it does not seem surprising that Marcel Breuer's creation evaded popularity, much to his disappointment.

After his Bauhaus career, Breuer spent some time in Berlin, designing private residences, buildings and commercial spaces. Later in his career, he also created innovative wooden furniture but his most famous design is definitely the Wassily Chair.

The Wassily Chair

The Wassily Chair was much more simplistic and structurally exposed compared to other chairs in the 1920's. Only very few members of the cultural elite recognized its beauty, while the vast majority would have never dreamed of using it as a chair. At best, it was an abstract piece of art.

The chair, which would later become world famous as the "Wassily Chair," was first manufactured in the late 1920s by Thonet as Model B3. Despite its name, the chair was never designed for Wassily Kandinsky, a conclusion that many jumped to due to Breuer's association with the artist while at the Bauhaus. Nevertheless, the artist Kandinsky had always admired the Model B3, and consequently, Breuer created a duplicate for Kandinsky's office. Interestingly, the majority of Breuer's other designs from the 1920's were licensed to Standard-Möbel, Lengyel & Company from Berlin, but not the Model B3.

The Model B3 was initially released in a folding version as well as the non-folding version, which is still available today. The early chairs had straps made of fabric - black, white or wire-mesh - instead of leather. Just like his other tubular steel furniture, the Model B3's lack of commercial success led Thonet to cease production World War II, and these original chairs are a very sought after collector's item nowadays.

In the 1960's, the Model B3 was re-released by Gavina of Bologna as the Wassily Chair, with leather instead of fabric. This time around, it was hugely successful. Finally, in 1968 Knoll of New York City acquired the Gavina Group of Bologna, and subsequently all of Breuer's designs were manufactured by them.

Today, all Model B3 patent designs are expired, and therefore you will find a number of manufacturers of this very chair. However, the trademark name rights to the design are still exclusively owned by Knoll. The Wassily Chair received an Award of the Museum of Modern Art in 1968 and in 1982, it was recognized as a "Piece of Art," in (West) Germany.

Just like the Wagenfeld Lamp, it took a while for the Wassily Chair to gain popularity but eventually it became a design classic. Even today, most people would consider the Wassily Chair modern - something many designers aspire to.

The Wassily Chair dimensions are 31″ W x 27 ½" D x 29″ H, with a seat height of 16 ½".

Knoll currently sells the Wassily Chair for $2264, while a knock-off version will set you back buy just a little more than $236.

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The Wassily Chair By Marcel Breuer - Gentleman's Gazette

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After sharing a pair of modern icons, the Wagenfeld Lamp and Thonet No 14 chair, one would be hard-pressed to overestimate the importance of the Wassily Chair, which evolved as a symbol of modernism and remains among the most famous of the Bauhaus chairs.

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T his year, the world celebrates the 100th anniversary of the most influential art and design school in history. The Bauhaus - founded in the German town of Weimar in aftermath of the First World War - lasted just 14 years, but in that time it offered an entirely new way of looking at the designed world, one that celebrated modern ideals of efficiency, industry and the purity of raw materials.

Prussian architect Walter Gropius founded the school in 1919 by merging two existing institutions: the Academy of Fine Arts and a more recently established School of Applied Arts. From the beginning, the Bauhaus was defined by bringing together what was formerly separate. It encouraged collaboration and shattered distinctions between fine art and craft, combining disciplines like furniture-making with architecture, poster design and urban planning.

The First World War had not only wreaked destruction across Europe, it had also ushered in a new age of mechanisation and industrial efficiency. The appropriate cultural response to the horrors of the war had to consider both of these facts equally. So, when it was established in 1919, the Bauhaus created entirely new "principles of living", says Angelika Nollert, Josef Straßer and Xenia Riemann-Tyroller, the curatorial team behind Reflex Bauhaus. 40 Objects - 5 Conversations, which opened at Die Neue Sammlung in Munich on 1 January. Bauhaus designers wanted to create functional products for the real world. They used materials like glass, wood and metal to create clean geometric shapes that could be easily replicated and mass-produced.

Painters such as Lyonel Feininger, who was Gropius's first faculty appointment at the Bauhaus and became the head of its printmaking workshop, applied the gestural marks of German Expressionism to the more orderly aesthetic principles of the the school. Feininger often used subdued colours and angular, geometric shapes in his work. His 1915 painting Brücke II (Bridge II), which is included in the Impressionist and Modern Art Evening Sale on 26 February, reveals how the ideas of the Bauhaus began to emerge - four years before the school was founded.

Dating from 1921, László Moholy-Nagy's Segments was painted two years before Walter Gropius invited the artist to join Bauhaus, and anticipates the ideas that he would go on to teach at the school. The painting's geometric forms are similar to the work abstract photograms he became famous for at the while at the academy, exposing light-sensitive paper with objects laid upon it.

Oskar Schlemmer's Tischgesellschaft (Group at Table), which dates from 1923 and also features in the upcoming sale, shows how the geometric principles of Bauhaus could equally be applied to figurative works depicting the human form. Schlemmer was a choreographer as well as an artist, and painted this shortly after creating Das Triadische Ballett (The Triadic Ballet) with composer Paul Hindemith, which premiered in Stuttgart in September 1922. His attention to the physical body in space - a key tenet of Bauhaus design - is carefully rendered through the combination of sharp lines and round figures.

Painted in 1928 while he taught at the Bauhaus, Wassily Kandinsky's Vertiefte Regung (Deepened Impulse) is typical of the artist's fascination with circles. His obsession with the shape was not only aesthetic; he once stated that the circle "points most clearly to the fourth dimension", and in this work the black background and brightly coloured, overlapping forms recall diagrams of outer space.

The Bauhaus was forced to close its doors in 1933 by the Nazis, but almost immediately its influence began to pop up in design across Europe. "After 1933, about 30 Bauhäusler [members of the Bauhaus group] came to the Netherlands," says Mienke Simon Thomas, curator of The Netherlands - Bauhaus: Pioneers of a New World at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam.

It would be wrong to try to pin the Bauhaus down to one particular aesthetic idea. "The Bauhaus itself changed every year during its 14 years of existence," Thomas says. More than a set of aesthetics or a series of principles, the Bauhaus was a community of people. It replaced the traditional teacher-pupil model of education with one based on mutual learning, a non-hierarchical group of artists all working together. "[It was] the network that was instrumental in giving new ideas and new designs," Thomas says. "[This is] how cultural developments work in practice: through people who meet people."

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A Century of Bauhaus: School of Modernity

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This year, the world celebrates the 100th anniversary of the most influential art and design school in history. The Bauhaus - founded in the German town of Weimar in aftermath of the First World War - lasted just 14 years, but in that time it offered an entirely new way of looking at the designed...

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BAUHAUS SPIRIT: 100 YEARS OF BAUHAUS Trailer

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A film by Niels Bolbrinker and Thomas Tielsch / An Icarus Films Release
http://icarusfilms.com/if-bau

What does a Latin American favela have to do with an old workers’ settlement in Dessau? What is the connection between a Jewish socialist in a rural commune and the children in a school class in Stockholm? All of these stories concern visions and the practical attempts to make them come true.

Nearly a hundred years ago, a radical artistic utopian was born in a tranquil town in Germany. Founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius, Bauhaus was supposed to unite sculpture, painting, design and architecture into a single combined constructive discipline. It is a combination of liberated imagination and stringent structure; cross-medial concepts that embellish and enrich our existence, illumination and clarity, order and playfulness. Bauhaus constituted one of the most significant contributions to everyday 20th-century culture and influential contemporary designs, and it was never just an artistic experiment. Confronted with the social conditions of that particular time, as well as the experience of the World War I, the movement concerned itself with the political and social connotations of design from the very outset. Hence, Bauhaus's history is not just the history of art, but also the history of an era that stretches from the early 20th century to the modern day. 

BAUHAUS SPIRIT describes the fascinating story of the Bauhaus as a statement, but also the failure and renewal of a social utopia. It tells of artists, scientists and architects today, who, in their examinations of current challenges also relate to the Bauhaus. That way, the story of this unfinished utopian project with its manifold exciting cross-references unfolds before our eyes while always keeping in touch with the questions still topical today: How do we want to live, where do we want to go?