Peter Grund (1892-1966) was a successful architect and urban planner. Trained in Darmstadt towards the end of the German Empire, he was a partner in the office of the established architect Karl Pinno in Dortmund during the Weimar Republic. At the start of the Third Reich, Grund was appointed director of the Düsseldorf Art Academy. In the Federal Republic of Germany, he was responsible for the reconstruction of Darmstadt as Chief Building Director.

Throughout all these periods, Peter Grund created well-known buildings and managed prominent projects: In Dortmund, he built the Nicolaikirche, Germany's first church made of exposed concrete. In Düsseldorf he was entrusted with the artistic direction of the 'Reichsausstellung Schaffendes Volk', the largest propaganda exhibition of National Socialism, with an accompanying model housing estate. In Darmstadt, he planned the reconstruction of the destroyed city centre and created striking urban spaces in the new city with the arcades of the Rheinstraße and the Kennedyhaus, which forms the square.

Influenced by the protection of local heritage, Grund's architecture was characterised throughout his career by simple forms and classical compositions. Alongside this continuation of traditional design methods for modern building tasks, his work also repeatedly shows the reception of avant-garde ideas, such as the exposed concrete church in Dortmund or the design of a town hall for Darmstadt in the style of American Bauhaus architecture.

Volume 1 of the monograph summarises the results of research into the life and work of Peter Grund in six essays, supplemented by current photos of selected buildings. The essays deal with biography, networks, architecture and urbanism. They offer a localisation and evaluation of his work at his places of activity in Dortmund, Düsseldorf and Darmstadt in the period from the Weimar Republic through National Socialism to the Federal Republic of Germany. In this way, lines of continuity in architecture and urban planning in Germany from the German Empire to the Federal Republic in the 1960s are also addressed.