Brahms office

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Brahms Kontor 2008
Sculptures

Brahms Kontor has been the name of an office building on Johannes-Brahms-Platz in Hamburg's Neustadt district since 2005 , which was built from 1903 to 1931 in several construction phases by the German National Handlers Association . The 55 meter high skyscraper with its 15 storeys, which was last built between 1927 and 1931, was the highest secular building in Hamburg at the time . From around 1965 to 2005 it was called the DAG House. The complex has been a listed building since 2003.

history

Facade relief with the names of the architects Sckopp and Vortmann (1920–1921)

1903/1904, the German National Handicrafts Association (DHV), founded in Hamburg in 1893, had the architects Lundt & Kallmorgen build a five- story residential and commercial building at Holstenwall 4 (today: 3–5), which was built from 1919 to 1921 by the architects Ferdinand Sckopp and Wilhelm Vortmann was raised to eight floors and given a simple clinker facade. From 1927 to 1931 the same architects added the building to Johannes-Brahms-Platz (Holstenplatz at the time) with the side wing at the Pilatus Pool, a clinker-clad steel frame building , which with its 15 storeys was the highest secular building in the city at the time.

The buildings were u. a. used by the management and administration of the DHV and the associated German National Health Insurance Fund, Ersatzkasse and the Deutscher Ring insurance group, which is also part of the DHV . In 1933 the DHV was brought into line, integrated into the German Labor Front and dissolved in 1934. The old building on Holstenwall was sold to the professional health insurance fund of the merchant's assistants (substitute fund ) , the high-rise to the Deutsche Ring .

While the old Holstenwall building was badly damaged in a bomb attack, the high-rise survived the Second World War largely intact. It was initially confiscated by the English occupation forces. It was then used by the Neue Welt insurance group , which, after the liquidation of the Deutscher Ring by Control Council Act No. 57 of August 30, 1947, took over its business operations and called itself Deutscher Ring again from 1953 . It also housed the World Economic Archives and the police headquarters until they moved into a new high-rise at Berliner Tor in 1962 . During the storm surge in 1962 , it was still used as an operations center for the then Interior Senator Helmut Schmidt .

The Holstenwall property, which had been transferred to the DAK replacement fund , was transferred in 1956 to the German Employees' Union (DAG), which was founded in 1949 and which was then awarded the high-rise in 1959. After the Deutsche Ring moved into its own new building on Ost-West-Straße (today: Ludwig-Erhard-Straße) in 1965, the entire administration and the board of the DAG could finally be accommodated there. For decades, the judiciary also rented rooms both on Holstenwall and in the high-rise for the public prosecutor's office, the district and regional court and for exams for the state law exams .

After the DAG was absorbed by the Ver.di union in 2001 with a new headquarters in Berlin, owner-occupation of the high-rise came to an end. The building is now owned by an asset management company belonging to the Ver.di union. The repair, which cost around 36 million euros and in which the building was partially gutted, was planned and managed by the architectural office Kleffel Köhnholdt Papay Warncke . The building has been marketed under its new name, Brahms Kontor , since 2005 .

Johannes-Brahms-Platz was only given this name in 1997 on the 100th anniversary of the death of Johannes Brahms . It appeared more effective in advertising for the Laeiszhalle opposite the Brahms Kontor with its Brahms monuments than the name Karl-Muck-Platz , which was given to the square in 1934 to honor the chief conductor of the Hamburg Philharmonic, Karl Muck , who retired in 1933 . Before that, it was called Holstenplatz because of its location at the former Holsten Gate .

layout

Already from a distance, on the side of the high-rise building facing the Holstenwall, a row of six larger than life bronze youths by Karl Opfermann , standing on top of one another on corbels in front of the facade, and also on the back at the Pilatus pool, a mighty bronze elephant "Anton" with a rider by Ludwig Kunstmann . Above all, the arcades to Johannes-Brahms-Platz are adorned with various ceramic reliefs, sculptures, ornaments and mosaics; Coats of arms on the ceiling remind of the provinces lost to the German Empire by the Treaty of Versailles . No less impressive and typical of the time are the entrance hall, lined with bright red tiles, which was restored to its original character during a renovation between 1987 and 1991, and the Art Deco- style staircase .

  • Bronze youth on Holstenwall (before renovation)

  • Ceiling mosaic in the arcade area

  • Small sculptures (ceramics)

  • Bronze elephant

  • Stairwell

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Brahms Kontor  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ List of monuments of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg . ( Memento from June 27, 2011 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 894 kB) Monument Protection Office in the Authority for Culture, Sport and Media, as of April 13, 2010, p. 84, list of monuments no. 1381.
  2. ↑ They had already built the office building at Oberwasserstraße 11–12, corner of Kreuzstraße, in Berlin-Mitte for the DHV 1912–1915, which is now the headquarters of the Foreign Office's communications center
  3. ^ The new home of the German National Handicrafts Association in Hamburg . In: Zentralblatt der Bauverwaltung , Vol. 44, No. 51 (December 20, 1924), urn : nbn: de: kobv: 109-opus-57588 , pp. 447–450.
  4. ^ Dissolution and liquidation of insurance companies affiliated with the German Labor Front http://www.verfassungen.de/de/de45-49/kr-gesetz57.htm
  5. ↑ The building was not only well known because of this, but as early as 1951, when "climbing maxi" Arnim Dahl hung herself on a huge Hamburg flag on September 12, in front of a large crowd and filmed by Fox 'Tönende Wochenschau from the ninth floor in order to exercise around it, and in the process ended up in mortal danger from which it was difficult to save himself. Dahl lives dangerously . In: Der Spiegel . No. 2 , 1953 ( online - cover story).
  6. ↑ ee: Pachyderm Anton is back in front of the Brahms office . In: The world . October 31, 2008 ( welt.de ).

Coordinates: 53 ° 33 '17 "  N , 9 ° 58' 45"  E