Few tools of Nazi propaganda were as potent or as permanent asarchitecture. At the instigation of Hitler, who had once aspired to bean architect, the Nazi regime placed unusual importance on thedesign of environments—whether cities, buildings, parade grounds, orhighways—that would glorify the Third Reich and express its dynamicrelationship to both the past and the future. Architecture and urbandesign were integral to the way the regime presented itself at homeand abroad. Newsreels supplemented direct personal experience ofmonumental buildings. Designed to last a thousand years, these edificesappeared to offer concrete testimony of the regime’s enduringcharacter. A more subtle integration of modern functions and vernacularforms, especially in suburban housing, suggested that technologicalprogress could coexist with an “organic” national communityrooted in a quasi-sacred understanding of the landscape.