Gifts form the basis of our collection. Thanks to the commitment of the avant-garde school’s former students and teachers, the Bauhaus-Archiv has been able to grow into the world’s largest Bauhaus collection: founded in 1960 by Hans Maria Wingler with the support of Walter Gropius, its initial goal was to collect and preserve the heritage of the former members of the Bauhaus, who had scattered around the world. In addition most of those teachers and students who still felt a close attachment to the place where they had been trained and taught entrusted large and important groups of their works to the Bauhaus-Archiv. Even today we still continue to be presented with generous gifts from their descendants and from Bauhaus enthusiasts.