Charlottenburg Town Hall
| Charlottenburg Town Hall | |
|---|---|
 Street view of the town hall, 2015 |
|
| Data | |
| place | Berlin-Charlottenburg |
| architect |
Heinrich Reinhardt , Georg Süßenguth |
| Architectural style | Historicism , Art Nouveau |
| Construction year | 1899-1905 |
| height | 88 m |
| Coordinates | 52 ° 31 '4 " N , 13 ° 18' 31" E |
The Charlottenburg Town Hall is located on Otto-Suhr-Allee in the Berlin district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf . It was built as a bourgeois monumental building between 1899 and 1905 in the then Brandenburg city of Charlottenburg . The building complex is located in the immediate vicinity of Richard-Wagner-Platz .
History and architecture
overview
In the course of its more than 200 year history, the town hall has been rebuilt, expanded and rebuilt several times. The location was also changed so that, strictly speaking, there are three different buildings belonging to the Charlottenburg city administration.
First Charlottenburg town hall
In 1705, a few weeks after Charlottenburg was granted city charter, the city administration inaugurated the city palace of the court official Marquis François d'Ausson de Villarnoux on Schloßstraße opposite Charlottenburg Palace as the town hall. The house was built in 1702 according to plans and under the direction of the master builder Johann Eosander von Göthe , who was also involved in the construction of Charlottenburg Palace. Friedrich I paid 8,500 thalers to buy the building. The town hall had to fulfill many functions; initially the court, the police and a small prison were also housed there. The village church was set up in an extension, a former horse stable . The tower, which was added in 1707, also served as a church and town hall tower.
The estate of the court servants along Schloßstraße housed around 100 residents. The magistrate initially consisted of members of the royal family and high court officials, with the king also being mayor. In the middle of the 19th century, the population of Charlottenburg was already 20,000. Although the administrative building was expanded, the explosive population growth in Charlottenburg soon led to bottlenecks again in the following years. The size of the city administration had to keep pace with the population growth and needed more and more space. Due to a lack of space and the poor condition of parts of the former palace, it was decided in 1857 to move to a new building. Also because of the increasing expansion of the city eastwards, towards Berlin, a central location for the town hall seemed more attractive. In 1881 the first town hall was finally demolished. After the inauguration of the new town hall, parts of the building served as a school, asylum for the homeless and a people's kitchen.
Second Charlottenburg town hall
In 1857 the city bought the palace of the chief stables master Encke including the property for 19,300 thalers. It was built in 1791 for the Royal Stable Master at Berliner Straße 25 (later: No. 73, since 1958 Otto-Suhr-Allee 96-98). The expansion to the commercial building of the city administration cost 8,000 thalers, of which the Prince Regent contributed half in 1859. On December 5, 1860, the inauguration and the start of business operations took place.
In 1887 the city of Charlottenburg acquired a plot of land next to the second town hall with small buildings in need of renovation for 16,000 marks (adjusted for purchasing power in today's currency: around 116,000 euros) at Berliner Straße 72 for a rent of 6,400 marks. The police prison was set up in the basement . At that time, the building comprised 17 rooms for the royal police headquarters and seven rooms for the city administration. From 1871 to 1910, the population of Charlottenburg grew from just under 20,000 to around 183,000. The new administration building should also reflect the self-confidence of the Charlottenburg bourgeoisie compared to the rather modest predecessor buildings . For the construction of the third town hall, the second town hall and its ancillary buildings were demolished around 1900.
Third Charlottenburg City Hall
Building history
In 1893 Charlottenburg had 100,000 inhabitants and thus achieved the status of a large city . At the beginning of the 20th century the number had grown to around 182,000 citizens, which again made a larger town hall necessary.
After an architectural competition was announced, the new, representative monumental building with various reception rooms, meeting rooms and ballrooms was built between 1899 and 1905 according to plans by the architects Heinrich Reinhardt and Georg Süßenguth . The boardroom alone cost 100,000 marks, the magistrate boardroom 25,200 marks. The town hall tower towered with a height of 88 meters, the dome of Charlottenburg Palace markedly. The main facade on Berliner Strasse (Otto-Suhr-Allee) was 70 meters in length and was designed with elements of historicism ; the lattice of the main portal has Art Nouveau forms . The side wings in the west and east were each 133 meters long. The construction costs amounted to 4.147 million marks (adjusted for purchasing power in today's currency: around 26.45 million euros). The new town hall was inaugurated on May 20, 1905 for the 200th anniversary of Charlottenburg.
In addition to the elaborate stucco work , paneling, stone grinding and wall decorations, sayings for a successful lifestyle were attached throughout the town hall.
An extension, planned and carried out by Heinrich Seeling , was started in 1911 and inaugurated in 1916. The building, which had been largely symmetrical until then, was expanded to the east. The facade east of the entrance on Berliner Straße was extended by two window widths, by an entrance (today: City Library ) and a lower facade. As a result, the original symmetry of the south facade, unbroken except for the facade figures, was lost. The exterior and interior design was created with artistic advice from Josef Reuters and Erich Threde .
A memorial hall for the dead from previous wars was set up in the town hall in 1921/22 .
During the Second World War , the town hall and the surrounding area were badly damaged in two Allied air raids in June and November 1943, and in 1945 the last intact parts of the building were also hit. 50 percent of the building was destroyed and 80 percent unusable. The makeshift construction began immediately, so that at the end of May 1945 a small part of the building could be put back into operation. However, the allegorical figures were lost after the reconstruction. The renovation of the offices and meeting rooms was carried out under the responsibility of the architect Hans Günther, which was completed at the end of 1952.
The complete reconstruction dragged on until the 1960s. Some structures on the facade, changes to the division of the meeting rooms and the like were also made. The construction costs amounted to around 5.1 million marks . In the following decades, too, parts of the monumental building were repeatedly renewed: in 1988 the roof covering with beaver tails was completely replaced by Dutch pans .
Architectural details
The basic building of the town hall consists of five wings and has a trapezoidal floor plan . In the ground floor area, the rustik dominates the facade. There are numerous decorative elements such as ornaments and figurines in Art Nouveau style along the entire street front . The rich decoration was a requirement of the city administration and the Prussian king: its opulence should be based on medieval town halls, but at the same time reflect the bourgeois self-confidence of that time in its abundance.
The ground floor has high, two-part arched windows , and reliefs by Hermann Giesecke are located at warrior height . On the second floor, the narrow high windows mark the location of the former ballroom. Above the row of windows is a frieze made of heraldic cartouches and allegorical figures, for which the artists Johannes Götz , Josef Drischler , Wilhelm Haverkamp and Heinrich Günther had provided designs.
The entrance portal in the middle risalit is provided with a wrought iron ornamental grille by A. M. Krause. Above it rises the curved loggia of the former mayor's room , next to which the allegorical figures of wisdom and justice by the sculptor August Vogel are attached. The risalit ends with a triangular gable, in which a relief designed by Ernst Westpfahl with depictions of the city's coat of arms, Pallas Athene , a building relief and symbols of the Prussian royal family are incorporated.
The high town hall tower with a square floor plan was already simplified in the first construction compared to the plans of the architects. It is crowned with a lantern .
Inside, however, construction was simpler and cheaper than the magistrate wanted. Original wall and ceiling paintings by Marno Keller were lost due to the war damage and were not renewed. Only the former municipal meeting room still shows largely figurative and floral representations from the early years.
The main staircase with a " narrative character " was created according to designs by Giesecke and Gotthold Riegelmann , the western staircase from Westpfahl. The main staircase widens into a spacious hall on the first floor. Earlier lead windows that continued the picture program are no longer preserved.
The extension has a central projection, flanked by two pilasters. A bay-like porch is located above the somewhat smaller arched portal . Two high rows of windows extend one above the other above the porch, closed off by a frieze of figures on the subject of the work of urban welfare based on a model by Vogel. Inside, behind the portal, a barrel-vaulted vestibule with a wall fountain by Bernhard Butzke awaits the visitor . The former Sparkassenhalle was converted into a library with terracotta decorations by Hinrichsen & Ludwig Isenbeck .
The war memorial hall of the town hall on the first floor is furnished with allegories of the eight virtues in tinted plaster by Hans Perathoner 1921/1922. The glass painter Rudolf Linnemann designed numerous glass windows and executed them. This hall has largely been preserved in its original equipment.
The facade of the extension is made of sintered lime .
Use of the building complex from 2001
After the merger of the districts of Charlottenburg and Wilmersdorf , which were independent until the district reform in 2001, to form the new district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf , the departments of the district office were distributed to both old districts. In Charlottenburg there is a citizens' office, but not in the town hall, but (with considerable staff cuts) in the nearby Wilmersdorfer Straße in the Wilmersdorfer Arcaden . The meeting rooms of the town hall will continue to be used for political work and cultural events. In addition, the district mayor has his seat in Charlottenburg. The district library is housed in the extension . The District Assembly (BVV) met regularly in the Wilmersdorf Town Hall until March 2013 . After the large meeting room in the Charlottenburg town hall had been rebuilt, BVV moved here in April 2013.
In the autumn of 2008, the Charlottenburg Town Hall took part in the Festival of Lights for the first time , after which its own lighting concept was developed. The town hall has been illuminated at night since then .
literature
- Max Creutz : The Charlottenburg town hall . In: Berliner Architekturwelt . Volume 8 (1906), urn : nbn: de: kobv: 109-opus-6544 , pp. 239–256. (Twenty pictures)
- Berthold Grzywatz: The Charlottenburg town hall. Edition Divan published by Stapp-Verlag, Berlin 1989, ISBN 3-87776-055-4 .
- Bertholt Grzywatz: The town halls of Charlottenburg. Berlin 1991, ISBN 3-87776-057-0 .
- Historical commission to Berlin (ed.): Charlottenburg - the historical city. Volume 1. Berlin 1986, ISBN 3-87584-167-0 , p. 289 ff.
Web links
- Gisela Scholtze: The three city halls of the city Charlottenburg . 1986, revised in 2006 by Monika Thiemen and Karl-Heinz Metzger.
- Charlottenburg Town Hall . District lexicon on berlin.de
- Entry in the Berlin State Monument List
- Berlin-Charlottenburg views
Individual evidence
- ↑ Henrike Hülsbergen (ed.): Charlottenburg is really a city - from the unpublished chronicles of Johann Christian Gottfried Dressel (1751-1824) . Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-925683-04-6 , p. 60.
- ↑ a b History of the City of Charlottenburg . Springer-Verlag, 1905, Volume I, p. 314 f., Textarchiv - Internet Archive
- ↑ Berlin Archive, Volume 4, B0603.
- ↑ Bertholt Grzywatz: The town halls of Charlottenburg . Berlin 1991, ISBN 3-87776-057-0 , p. 29 and 80.
- ^ Max Creutz: The Charlottenburg town hall. In: Berliner Architekturwelt - magazine for architecture, painting, sculpture and applied arts of the present , 8th year (1906), p. 240, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
- ^ Sayings in the Charlottenburg town hall . In: berlin.de , District Office Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf of Berlin, accessed on September 6, 2018.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Georg Dehio: Handbook of German art monuments. Berlin ; Deutscher Kunstverlag 2006, ISBN 3-422-03111-1 , p. 221f.
- ↑ a b c Charlottenburg Town Hall . District lexicon on berlin.de