International Style

American  

noun

1. the general form of architecture developed in the 1920s and 1930s by Gropius, Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, and others, characterized by simple geometric forms, large untextured, often white, surfaces, large areas of glass, and general use of steel or reinforced concrete construction.

2. (sometimes lowercase) any of various 20th-century styles in art, as cubism or abstract expressionism, that have gained wide currency in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and elsewhere.

3. International Gothic.

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International Style British  

noun

1. a 20th-century architectural style characterized by undecorated rectilinear forms and the use of glass, steel, and reinforced concrete

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Etymology

Origin of International Style

First recorded in 1930–35

Example Sentences

But greater impact, we see, was made by the German pavilion designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich using Roman travertine, green marble, onyx and glass, ushering in architecture’s International Style.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 14, 2026

The Aluminaire House, one of the earliest and edgiest examples of the International Style of modernist architecture in America, was never meant to withstand a harsh desert climate.

From New York Times • Jan. 25, 2024

The Historic Colors of America paint-color list, curated by the regional heritage organization Historic New England, includes greens used for decorating homes in every architectural era, from Colonial to International Style.

From Washington Post • Oct. 12, 2020

In 1932, at the then-new Museum of Modern Art, he produced a significant show that introduced Americans to the work of Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, and Le Corbusier—what Johnson called the International Style.

From The New Yorker • Dec. 12, 2018

International Style: generic name attached to the functionalist, anti-ornamental, and geometric tendency of architecture in the second quarter of the 20th century.

From The Civilization of Illiteracy by Nadin, Mihai