Braunschweig School

The name Braunschweiger Schule is used to designate architecture teaching at the Technical University of Braunschweig in the decades after the Second World War .

The Braunschweig University of Technology

The Technical University of Braunschweig goes back to the Collegium Carolinum founded in Braunschweig in 1745 and was renamed the Ducal Technical University of Carolo-Wilhelmina in 1878 . The architecture teaching there had enjoyed a national reputation since the late 19th century thanks to professors such as Ludwig Winter , Constantin Uhde , Georg Lübke and Carl Mühlenpfordt . In 1968 the university was given its current name, Technical University Carolo-Wilhelmina, and in 1995 it celebrated its 250th anniversary.

Time and personnel definition

“Braunschweig School” is not an official term, but a name for the educational effect of Braunschweig architecture teaching in the post-war period. It should be limited in time from around 1946 to the early 1980s. A special stylistic feature is the strong connection between their period of activity - the post-war period  - with the school curriculum as well as the incisive teacher personalities. Professors Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer , Dieter Oesterlen and Walter Henn were the most influential in terms of personnel . They formed a kind of “ triumvirate of architectural theory” in Braunschweig. In addition, teachers such as Johannes Göderitz , Zdenko von Strizic and Konrad Hecht were included.

In 1946 Kraemer took over the professorship for building theory and design, the main design chair at the TH Braunschweig. He is considered to be the founder of the Braunschweig School and advocated the appointment of Dieter Oesterlen, who took on a second design chair in 1952, and Walter Henn, who was appointed professor of building construction and industrial construction from Dresden in 1953 .

The school had its greatest impact in the 1950s and 1960s. With the retirement of Kraemers in 1974, Oesterlen in 1976 and Henns in 1982, the strongly personal Brunswick school disintegrated, whereas its reputation for architecture education in Brunswick has been preserved to this day.

Architectural-historical effect

The Braunschweiger Schule was an influential German architecture school of the post-war period. Mainly defining the north of Germany, it is comparable in reputation and impact to the Karlsruhe School in south Germany. Her teaching was based on the ideals of New Building , the modern architecture of the 1920s and early 1930s. The focus was on striving for a “holistic” architecture, taking into account the three aspects of function, construction and form, which were summarized in a systematic, work-related teaching. In contrast, according to the program of this school, questions of style or regionalism should not play a special role.

The three main teachers represented the individual aspects in their individual form: Kraemer mainly represented the area of ​​functional theory, which he illustrated with his numerous office buildings. Henn was mainly responsible for the constructive questions, especially in industrial construction . With a more artistic design approach, Oesterlen, on the other hand, particularly covered the subject of formal design. What all three had in common, however, despite their individual focus, was the comprehensive consideration of all three aspects in order to counteract a fragmentation of the teaching.

The rationalism had special influence on the Braunschweig School. Kraemer was of the opinion that "subjective arbitrariness is opposed to overriding phenomena of order [...]". In the area of ​​design in particular, he developed a theory of proportions , building on the grid as the architectural basis. Characterized by an understanding of space based on loosening up urban planning and the use of stereometric structures, Kraemer spoke of space as the “positional relationship of bodies”. The Braunschweig school also had a formative effect on the handling of historically grown building fabric through Oesterlen's doctrine of "bound contrast".

The Braunschweig School claims to have gained its special position within the German architectural landscape of the post-war period, both through the personal authority of its teachers and through the claim that it can be scientifically objectified in teaching. Through systematics and the combination of function, construction and form, she wanted to convey security in the question of the "correct" architecture in the succession of architecture under National Socialism . Its reductionist, factual architecture, also based on international models, had a lasting influence on the image of German post-war architecture. Thanks to students like Eckhard Gerber , Meinhard von Gerkan , Volkwin Marg , Hans-Joachim Pysall , Peter Stahrenberg and Hans Struhk, she continues to work today.

Criticism of the Braunschweig school

The Braunschweig School and its representatives were in some cases exposed to considerable criticism: For example, in the early 1960s, the Braunschweig state curator Kurt Seeleke reproached Kraemer for not - together with his influential colleagues - getting stronger or too late for the preservation of the Braunschweig Palace to have used. Other criticisms learned the school in connection with parallel developments such as the " car-friendly city " of Hans Bernhard Reichow or factual reductionism to the effect that she was accused of having set construction debris in medieval embossed cities that are neither historical grown city layouts and -Landscapes yet would have taken appropriate consideration of the neighboring buildings.

Exemplary buildings (selection)

 Map with all coordinates: OSM | WikiMap

image	building	location	Construction year	draft	comment
	Administration building Pfeiffer & Schmidt	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 15 ′ 51 ″ N, 10 ° 31 ′ 7 ″ E )	1952	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer
	Flebbe department store	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 15 ′ 45 ″ N, 10 ° 31 ′ 32 ″ E )	1954	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer
	Skyscraper of the Faculty of Construction at the Technical University of Braunschweig	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 16 ′ 23 ″ N, 10 ° 31 ′ 30 ″ E )	1956	Dieter Oesterlen
	Administration building Unterharzer Berg- und Hüttenwerke	Goslar ( 51 ° 54 ′ 6 ″ N, 10 ° 25 ′ 8 ″ E )	1958	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer
	Braunschweig cafeteria of the Studentenwerk Ostniedersachsen	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 16 ′ 29 ″ N, 10 ° 31 ′ 34 ″ E )	1962	Walter Henn	The building was significantly changed in the early 2000s through gutting , redistribution and facade renovation. ( Picture )
	Centennial Hall	Frankfurt am Main , Unterliederbach ( 50 ° 5 ′ 57 ″ N, 8 ° 31 ′ 8 ″ E )	1963	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer and Ernst Sieverts	Hall on a rectangular base with a dome 100 m in diameter. The domed hall covers an area of ​​4800 m² and can accommodate up to 4800 people.
	Institute for Piston and Flow Machines at the Technical University	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 16 ′ 39 ″ N, 10 ° 32 ′ 18 ″ E )	1965	Walter Henn
	Historical museum on the high bank	Hanover ( 52 ° 22 ′ 19 ″ N, 9 ° 43 ′ 53 ″ E )	1966	Dieter Oesterlen
	Headquarters Osram Licht AG	Munich ( 48 ° 6 ′ 44 ″ N, 11 ° 33 ′ 57 ″ E )	1966	Walter Henn	Cubic, six-storey steel frame construction with a square floor plan, aluminum-glass curtain wall , entrance canopy on supports. Foyer with glass prismatic wall by Alois Ferdinand Gangkofner and wooden inlay wall by Fred Stelzig . In 2015 it was decided to demolish the building.
	University forum of the Technical University	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 16 ′ 25 ″ N, 10 ° 31 ′ 47 ″ E )	1957-1971	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer
	Building ensemble Kurt-Schumacher-Straße (Iduna residential high-rise buildings, shopping center and atrium hotel)	Braunschweig ( 52 ° 15 ′ 14 ″ N, 10 ° 32 ′ 11 ″ E )	1965-1972	Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer	The original facade design was significantly changed by renovation measures.

Literature selection

• Dieter Oesterlen : Buildings and Texts. 1946-1991. Wasmuth, Tübingen / Berlin 1992, ISBN 3-8030-0153-6 .
• Roland Böttcher, Kristiana Hartmann, Monika Lemke-Kokkelink : The architecture teachers at the TU Braunschweig. in. Braunschweig workpieces. Volume 41. City Library, Braunschweig 1995, ISBN 3-87884-046-2 .
• Holger Pump-Uhlmann: The "Braunschweiger Schule". in: TU Braunschweig: From the Collegium Carolinum to the Technical University 1745–1995. S. 747, Olms, Hildesheim 1995, ISBN 3-487-09985-3 .
• Karin Wilhelm, Olaf Gisbertz, Detlef Jessen-Klingenberg, Anne Schmedding: Law and Freedom. The architect Friedrich Wilhelm Krämer (1907–1990). Jovis, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-939633-20-4 .
• Olaf Gisbertz (Ed.) For the Braunschweiger Schule network: Post-war modernity controversial. Positions of the present. Jovis, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-86859-122-4 .
• Anne Schmedding, Between tradition and modernity: The "Braunschweiger Schule". Architectural training at the TU / TH Braunschweig after 1945 until the end of the 1960s , in: Detlef Schmiechen-Ackermann , Hans Otte and Wolfgang Brandes (eds.), Universities and Politics in Lower Saxony after 1945 (= publications by the Historical Commission for Lower Saxony and Bremen , Vol. 274), Göttingen 2014, pp. 41–52, ISBN 978-3-8353-1535-8
• Martin Peschken, Arne Herbote, Anikó Merten, Christian von Wissel (eds.): Findbuch Braunschweiger Schule: Architekturdiplom 1945–2015 . Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture and the City (GTAS) - Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig 2015, ISBN 978-3-00-049621-9

Web links

• The Braunschweiger Schule on the website of the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture and the City, TU Braunschweig, accessed on November 13, 2016
• Braunschweiger Schule on Baunetzwoche No. 251, accessed on November 13, 2016
• brant-expo - Braunschweig architecture networks on brant-expo.de
• Friedrich Wilhelm Kraemer on architekten-portrait.de
• Dieter Oesterlen on architekten-portrait.de
• Walter Henn on architekten-portrait.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} F. W. Kraemer on architekten-portrait.de
2. ↑ The department store Flebbe, Braunschweig on architekten-portrait.de
3. ↑ D. Oesterlen on architekten-portrait.de
4. ↑ ^{a b} W. Henn on architekten-portrait.de
5. ↑ Jahrhunderthalle at structurae.de
6. ^ Website of the Jahrhunderthalle Frankfurt , accessed on July 8, 2018
7. ↑ Linda Jessen: Demolition and new construction at Osram. Evening newspaper , December 28, 2015, accessed on November 13, 2016 .