WAUA- writings on architecture, urbanism & art

One of these days, it will be twenty years since the Berlin Wall fell. Since then, Germany has been reunited and Berlin has risen like a comet, or phoenix, and crash-landed again. During the first few years after the wall came down, there was an investment in the reunited city that rarely has been rivaled in Europe. The Reichtag, the entire Government district, Potsdamer Platz, the new Hauptbahnhof and so on, the list is long. At some point however, Berlin ran out of money and the city has been struggling economically since. The construction has continued, and if you thought Potsdamer Platz was a low quality project without any connection to the existing city, it’s nothing compared to what is going up these days along Bernuaer Straße or in Friedrichshain along the Spree.

Most of the projects mentioned above are or were built on the land where the wall used to run, and why not? Suddenly there was an abundance of land in the centre of a city of three million, a rarity anywhere in the world, and in Europe in particular. To some, the void left after the wall is a scar, an open wound, and to them the voids can’t be filled rapidly enough. The voids then appear as an open wound, of an uncomfortable past, and as long as the scar is there, the division of Germany, and the inequalities resulting from the unification are present. These memories can’t be put into the history books as a past until the void is filled. As long as the wound is open, the past leaks into the present. Monuments make history, while scars keeps the past in the present, since the results, and not the monuments of history are what we are presented with, the events must still be contemporary rather than historical.

The voids can however also be argued to be a symbol of freedom, as a symbol of democracy and of opportunity. The wall was the millstone around the neck of Berlin, and what is left after it was torn down is practically the opposite. The cultural capital Berlin has become would be unthinkable without the voids, this is where nightclubs, art-installations, concerts, flea markets and so on thrived to make Berlin what it is today. These spaces that can be used for anything, or for nothing. These are spaces where experimental culture can thrive and evolve. It is in these spaces that lack programming that you can try to use in different ways, these spaces are the cornerstones of cultural innovation in this city. The symbol of oppression became the stage for freedom.

So, in these days of celebrating the Mauerfall, can’t we just agree that the few spaces left are monuments? If we regard these spaces monuments of freedom and cultural assets rather than scars and potential eventual economic assets, we should all be all right.

Basically a monument is a space or an object designed primarily to commemorate a certain occasion or person. The function of the monument is solely to preserve this memory, it has no other programming. This is the beauty of the monument, and over time the function of the monument changes, but it gets a justification, or legitimisation through its nature as a monument. When there is a monument, planners and architects do not need to find a function to fill out the space, to assign it a function, or to program it in any other way.

If we decide the voids of Berlin are spatial monuments, they are no longer empty spaces without function. On the contrary, the void becomes a space to preserve. These spaces are not empty canvases to be filled out in order to complete the city, they already have a function, albeit an informal one. They are just spaces that are free, to use or to inhabit in different ways as long as it is of a temporary nature. The activities taking place in these spaces are themselves monuments to freedom, rituals enhancing the role of the monuments.

The rituals of these spaces already exist, they are already functioning as the monuments of freedom in everything but name, so why not just see the voids as the monuments they are, and allow them to continue to evolve and enhance the cultural life of Berlin?

The railway station, as a building type, has had its ups and downs over the last two centuries. From its humble beginnings in Liverpool, it evolved into the grandiose cathedrals of St Pancras, London, Grand Central Terminal, NYC or the Victoria Terminus in Bombay.

Then, at some point in the middle of the last century, they fell from grace. From being the cathedrals of modern rapid transport, the railway stations became the local epi-centre of urban vice when airports became the glamorous, nodes of travel. King’s Cross, London, and Københavns Hovedbanegård would two examples.

Lately though, as airports become ever less glamorous and environmentally abominable in the public eye, railway stations have, during the last decades, yet again become monumental cathedrals of transportation. The train station has come out of hiding and claims space in the city where it becomes the most important of transportation nodes.

Berlin has got a brand spanking new train station (Berlin Hauptbahnhof), it was opened as late as in 2006, and is currently the largest crossing station in Europe. It is located in Moabit, an area that was more or less wall adjacent during the cold war. Large parts of the area were empty when the wall came down and a lot of government buildings sprang up south of the station during the early nineties when money poured into the city.

The station itself was the last of these grand projects to be completed, long after the steam had gone out of the over-optimistic post-wall Berlin. The final cost of the construction landed somewhere around €700,000,000.

The thing that interests me with train stations is usually not the actual building, but what kind of urban environment that surrounds it, the local context, from King’s Cross’ (formerly) seedy context to Venice’s glorious embankment, the area around train stations is never really dull.

Today, the Hauptbahnhof sits in, more or less lone majesty, surrounded by parking lots, wasteland and the river. With the railway stations’ refound status, I’ve been curious regarding what will grow up around the Hauptbahnhof, until last week when the plans for the area immediately south of the station were presented in a number of local newspapers.

Basically the plan is to construct a whole batch of hotels, totaling approximately 1,200 beds, mostly orientated to a budget market, a congress centre for 3,500 people and 300 or so car parking spaces.

Well, I can understand that tourism is one of the expanding industries in Berlin, and the fact that there is a lack of centrally located congress centres as far as I can understand. But that’s basically as far as I can sympathize with this plan. To create a tourist enclave in the middle of Berlin, isolated by government offices that are empty in the evenings, train tracks and the river is just idiotic.

First of all, this area could be so much more, it needs to become integrated with Berlin, not isolated from it. The Hauptbahnhof is not an airport in the middle of nowhere, it is an extremely central part of the city. To create a tourist island here is to separate it from the rest of the city.

Secondly, any urban area needs to develop over time, instant programs of a larger scale focusing on one function usually become very dreary. Any major European city has a number of more or less failed (on an urban level) large scale single function developments, especially those developed in a haste.

Thirdly, is it even going to be attractive to tourists? The reason you go to Berlin as a tourist is for the vibrant mix of everything, it is functionally quite an integrated city. Cheap bars next expensive hotels, squats next to banks, there’s always a surprise down every street. We all know that’s not going to last, but that’s no reason to speed up the generification (is that a proper word actually?) of Berlin willfully.

I do appreciate that the incentive for this is economical and my arguments against it aren’t very economical. I do also appreciate the fact that Berlin is still a scarred city with many blanks in the urban fabric, and some people are itching to mend them. But I can’t help but feel that the city sells itself short, over and over again.

There are lots of examples, read Architecture in Berlin’s posts on Mediaspree, or Alexanderplatz. The blanks in the urban fabric, that some are so eager to fill in, are part of what gives Berlin unique charm. The undefined spaces, that with temporary modification can become anything, allow things to prosper, ideas, art, clubs and so forth that would never even be able to survive for a week elsewhere.

However, this will most likely give Berlin something else that’s unique; a dull area just outside a major railway station.

Alexa: A new 54 000 square meter shopping mall by Alexanderplatz, Berlin. A few months ago, this gigantic new shopping mall opened in the centre of Berlin. It is located right next to the Alexanderplatz although it turns its back to the over-sized square with it’s famous TV-tower.

The mall itself can be described as huge, pink, and vaguely resembling a monstrous pastry (marshmallow man out of Ghost busters type of thing). According to the architects, it’s an Art Deco development, designed to remind of the roaring twenties. A very clumsy attempt to recreate a more acceptable past yet again perhaps. Or is it just an excuse to get a project through planning that wouldn’t have passed without years of debate had it been in a less populist style.

The Municipality and government originally intended for the land around Alexanderplatz to be developed in smaller plots, containing government buildings and embassies and other official buildings. These instead ended up around Pariser Platz, Potsdamer Platz and Tiergarten. The sites around Alexanderplatz were left without any purpose. The site of Alexa was also a rather difficult one, a block off Alexanderplatz, next to the S-bahn tracks and in the middle of several traffic interchanges. Sometimes I feel that this city is so desperate to become whole again, it sells itself short. Potsdamer Platz is not my favorite development, yet it’s from a different division in architectural quality compared to Alexa. This desperation to have a fully operational world class city a.s.a.p. is not really helping achieving any long term goal for Berlin. From a strictly architectural viewpoint, Berlin would do well to slow down rather than fill in the gaps as fast as possible. These are however desperate times, and have been so ever since the recession set in, but it must be possible to do better than this.

You’ll find no argument from me that Alexanderplatz needs a makeover and needs cheering up. I would however argue that the main problem of Alexanderplatz is a problem with scale rather than lack of tacky arcthitecture in funny colours. In a time when even Dubai and Las Vegas are employing international architects to improve their tacky reputation, Berlin goes in the other direction.

Alexa appears to be the physical manifestation of the shock therapy in capitalism, imposed by the IMF on Russia after the communist system collapsed. One could however question its legitimacy 20 years later. An embassy of vulgar capitalism in the heart of former GDR. One can’t help to appreciate the irony.

“He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.”

George Orwell, 1984

Once upon a time, the Prussian Stadtschloss (Berlin Palace), graced Unter den Linden in Berlin with its presence. The palace dates back to the early 15^th century, over the centuries it was adapted from midevial, to renaissance and finally baroque style (by Schlueter) to become the symbol of the Prussian kingdom in the beginning of the 18^th century and continued to be adapted to the style of the time up to 1945. The palace was severly damaged by the allied bombing raids towards the end of the war, and when the war finally was over, it was more or less a ruin.

After the war, the palace ended up in the Soviet sector, in what eventually became East Berlin, capital of the GDR. Some unsuccessful attempts to secure a restoration were made by, among others, Hans Scharoun. In the end, the GDR government thought it too costly to refurbish the palace, and subsequently demolished it in 1950.

The site was then used as a square for various ceremonies until the mid 1970’s when the Palast der Republik was constructed on the site. PdR was the main event building in the GDR for cultural and political events, and remained so until the reunification.

After reunification, public opinion grew, especially in the western parts of the country, for reconstructing the old Berlin Palace. When asbestos was found in high amounts in the PdR, its fate was sealed. The parliament quickly clubbed a decision to rebuild the old castle.

As far as I understand, the intention is to rebuild the facades of the 19^th century version of the palace on three sides using traditional techniques to its baroque glory. The fourth side will be decided in an architectural competition. The floor plans will not be of the original, some of the more famous halls and staircases will be carelessly reconstructed in simpler detailing, while the rest will be, adapted for modern purposes. These are a couple of museums and a business center of some sort. The courtyard will be rebuilt and glazed over (similarly to British Museum in London, but without any of the finesse as far as I can tell from the renders. All to be privately funded by companies, organisations and individuals.

This entire story raises a number of interesting questions.

Firstly, can you create a historical identity at will by picking out what you like? Whichever way you put it, Palast der Republik is a major part of 20^th century, like it or not. You can argue that it was a symbol of oppression and totalitarianism, and it is probably so perceived by most people. On the other hand, the Prussians were no angels neither, and the PdR was undeniably historical.

Isn’t this simply a very expensive attempt to rewrite history? To control the past in order to control the future, like O’Brien explains to Winston. To create a glorious past that is seen from a long enough distance in time to appear attractive. The total cost of this is estimated to somewhere around €650,000,000.

I’m not categorically negative to reconstruction of destroyed buildings, but this thing is silly, and it’s not even a reconstruction of the “original” but rather a reconstruction of three facades and a courtyard focusing on the palace when it had been altered during four hundred years. Scenography is a word that comes to mind. Nothing wrong with scenography, but I would be careful with talking to such an extent about the soul and identity of Berlin, like the castle supporters do, when constructing scenography.

I’m also reminded of the old problem from first day in philosophy class: a ship sets out to sea, during its voyages, parts are replaced as they fail. After a number of years, every last part has been replaced, is it then the same ship that set out? In this case, the ship has sunk. A new ship is constructed, 80 years later but with an engine room. The masts are still there but will merely be there for show. Is it then the same ship? To me, this is a silly proposition, replacing one symbol of oppression with another that is more clouded in history and thus more acceptable. But, we can always tear down the mock-palace and build a model of Palast der Republik, shaped like a can of coke, in a century or so. Can anyone think of a better way of spending money?

This is a short story of a small ramshackle house on a traffic island on Bethaniendamm, Kreuzberg

The story begins in 1983 and takes place on a small plot of land in what technically was no man’s land, on the actual border strip. A small unused piece of land on western side of the wall was at that time a derelict wasteland, unusable territory that due to its legal status as no man’s land was left to decay.

Then one day in 1983, a local neighbor decided to turn this into a vegetable garden. This was unpopular with the GDR officials who were suspicious of any activity in proximity to the wall. The gardener however lived in West Berlin and this made it a sensitive issue. In the end it was left unresolved, even when he eventually built a small house on the site with scrap pieces found in the streets and moved in.

When the wall came down in 1989 the garden ended up on the border between the boroughs of Mitte and Kreuzberg. The Mitte authorities tried to evict the squatter, but as this was still a border issue, albeit a less sensitive one, the matter remained unresolved. In 2004, it was finally settled that the tiny plot of land should belong to the Kreuzberg borough, a traditionally open minded borough that was willing to allow the garden to remain on the site.

I can’t help but love the story of these interstitial settlements, how they pop up and survive for so long, balancing on the borderline. This one starts off on land which is technically unusable and turns it into something useful. What once was the very definition of the outskirts of West Berlin is now in the middle of the re-united city.

Geçekondu-Turkish word for illegal settlement on the outskirts of the city

If you look up the term “Cyberpunk” in Wikipedia, you’ll find an image of Sony Center in Potsdamer Platz. Cyberpunk is as a genre of literature and films, and is usually set in a near future dystopia, with “high-tech and low life”, artificial intelligence and corporations running amok, where nothing is as it seems to our eyes. All in all an extremely in-human world. Bladerunner is a prime example of the genre.

The Wikipedia image caption states that Sony Center has aesthetic qualities resembling of the genre, but on the other hand, one could extend the analogy to cyberpunk even further.

Potsdamer Platz used to be the absolute city centre in Berlin in the twenties, it was the largest traffic junction on the continent, a huge number of vehicles and trams passed by every day and this also led to the erection of Europe’s first traffic light. Since a bunch of Third Reich official buildings were located in the vicinity, the area was reduced to rubble in the allied bombing raids. During the cold war, the area was part of No man’s land, and remained barren. When the wall came down, officials in Berlin were suddenly faced with the fact that their once city center was still rubble.

As the reunited Berlin was a city with aspirations, everything was done to make sure the area was returned to its vibrant pre-war self as quickly as possible. In order to achieve this, the large area was reduced to three sites, each to be sold off to just one corporation. Naturally, the prospect of cheap inner city land made many a corporation start drooling, and in the end the two largest slices were snatched up by Sony and Daimler-Benz and they set forth to develop the area at neck-breaking speed. The objective was to create the resemblance of urbanity, shops, cafes, theaters and so on on ground level. An urban area containing pedestrian streets, lined with trees, fountains and the usual urban paraphernalia. The only difference is that it is almost entirely privately owned and managed. A meticulously controlled private city. Quite cyberpunk, isn’t it?