Josef Hoffmann (1870–1956) was an Austrian architect and designer who stands as one of the pivotal figures of the Vienna Secession and the broader European Arts and Crafts movement. Born in Pirnitz (now Brtnice, in the Czech Republic), Hoffmann studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna under Otto Wagner, the theorist of modern architecture whose commitment to functional rationalism and honest use of materials deeply influenced his thinking. In 1897, Hoffmann was among the founding members of the Vienna Secession, the revolutionary artistic association that broke with the conservative Academy to champion a new, unified vision of art and design.

In 1903, together with the designer Koloman Moser and the patron Fritz Waerndorfer, Hoffmann co-founded the Wiener Werkstätte — the Vienna Workshops — a collective of craftsmen and designers dedicated to producing objects of the highest quality in which artistic vision and skilled handicraft were inseparable. The Werkstätte's output, ranging from furniture and metalwork to textiles and jewelry, embodied the Gesamtkunstwerk ideal: the vision of a total work of art in which every element of the designed environment was conceived as a coherent whole. Hoffmann's own designs were characterized by geometric rigor, elegant simplicity, and an exquisite sensitivity to materials.

His most celebrated architectural achievement is the Palais Stoclet in Brussels (1905–1911), a private mansion commissioned by the Belgian industrialist Adolphe Stoclet. With its marble-clad exterior, severe geometric forms, and interior decorated by Gustav Klimt, the Palais Stoclet is recognized as one of the masterpieces of early twentieth-century European architecture and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Hoffmann's influence on the development of modern design — particularly on the trajectory from Art Nouveau toward the clean geometric vocabulary of Art Deco and early Modernism — was profound and enduring. He continued to work as an architect and teacher well into the mid-twentieth century, and his legacy is honored in the history of both architecture and the decorative arts.