Franz Ehrlich – A BAUHAUS student

The fitter Franz Ehrlich studied at the Dessau Bauhaus from 1927 to 1930 and then worked as a designer and typographer in Berlin and Leipzig. Arrested for being an active Communist and involved in the resistance, he first served a prison sentence; then, in 1937, the Gestapo committed him to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Here his skills brought him to the SS construction office, where he had to design furniture, buildings and the iron camp gate. Unbeknownst to the SS, he modelled the letters of the gate inscription “Jedem das Seine” (“To Each His Own”) after typefaces designed by his Bauhaus teachers. Released in 1939, he was forced to continue working for SS construction management, conscripted to the “probationary battalion” 999 in 1943, and ultimately taken prisoner of war. After his return he worked as an architect and designer.