Finnish settlement

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Houses of the Finnish settlement

The Finnensiedlung is a listed housing estate in Cologne-Höhenhaus in the immediate vicinity of the Dünnwald forest . The Cologne residential complex, designed entirely as a prefabricated wooden housing estate, was built in 1942 and comprises 158 wooden houses.

history

Due to the time of origin and probable circumstances, the sources of the so-called Finnensiedlung in Cologne-Höhenhaus are very poor. Written documents were not available as early as the 1980s, surveys of residents, stylistic assessments and the naturalized name of the settlement form the basis for several versions of its establishment.

According to one version, the building materials for the construction of the settlement reached Cologne from Finland during the Second World War , according to another, they are said to have been a gift from the Finnish government for the help of the German SS during the Finnish-Norwegian war of 1939/40. In fact, due to the Hitler-Stalin Pact , the German Reich held back with help in favor of Finland in its winter war of 1939/40 with the Soviet Union. It was only in the so-called Continuation War that Finland tried, with German support, to regain territories that had previously been lost to the USSR. On June 26, 1944, at the time the settlement was founded, a de facto military alliance was concluded with the Ryti-Ribbentrop Treaty between the Republic of Finland and the German Reich, but this was ultimately no longer implemented. Confirmed evidence of the transport of such an amount of building material in 1943/44 from Finland to Germany has not yet been found. Nor is there any evidence for the sometimes held view that the overall floor plan should be reminiscent of the shape of a Finn dagger.

The settlement was built from 1942 to help families in Cologne's old town that had been bombed out under the nickname “Neue Heimat”. Forced laborers were used to carry out the work, possibly via the German Labor Front (DAF). It is documented that around 30 prisoners of the so-called “SS Building Brigade III”, who were housed in the exhibition center in Deutz , were used in the construction from around 1942/43 . After 1940, DAF acted several times as a builder of Cologne housing complexes on the right bank of the Rhine in the sense of Hitler's “social housing”.

After the end of the Second World War, the buildings were completed through self-help by bomb victims and war returnees. The owner was the "Gemeinnützige Wohnungs- und Siedlungsgesellschaft Rheinland"; however, all objects are now privately owned.

In the settlement, which is largely still closed (only two houses burned down in the 1950s and 1986), television shoots are occasionally carried out.

Building description

The semi-detached houses with a basement were built on plots of around 400 m² in size. The buildings on the eaves are covered with a saddle roof and dormer window and originally did not have a bathroom inside, but only a laundry room in the basement. The wooden structure consists of dark-stained wood, which, in conjunction with the white door and window openings, gave it a Scandinavian look. Especially since their sale, the residential buildings have been modernized in the sanitary facilities, windows and doors.

Others

In terms of development history, the settlement stands in a row with another 50 Finnish settlements or Finnish house settlements in Germany and Austria. In today's Cologne city area there is a similar residential complex completely designed as a wooden house settlement in the Zündorf district (for the members of the Aerostahl company, hence also known as the Luftwaffe settlement ). This was built between 1941 and 1943 and originally comprised 40 semi-detached houses in the streets Kinkelsmaarweg and Kirschweg. They were sold to tenants in 1969 by the Wahn federal property office. Most of the houses in this black settlement were later clinkered or clad, so that the original settlement character has been largely lost today. Further settlements in Cologne were built in Rath (for Reichsbahner) and in Junkersdorf .

literature

  • Werner Heinen, Anne-Marie Pfeffer: Cologne: Settlements 1888-1988. (= Stadtspuren. Monuments in Cologne. Volume 10.1) JP Bachem, Cologne 1988, ISBN 3-7616-0929-9 , pp. 292, 298-300.
  • Werner Heinen: The Cologne settlements. In: Cologne-seine buildings 1928-1988. Published by the Cologne Architects and Engineers Association from 1875 in collaboration with the Cologne University of Applied Sciences, JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 1991, ISBN 3-7616-1074-2 , p. 372.
  • Kemp, Alfred: Cologne Höhenhaus between then and yesterday. Cramer, Cologne 1996, new edition 2007, p. 6.
  • Hiltrud Kier , Karen Lieserfeld, Horst Matzerath (eds.): Architecture of the 30s / 40s in Cologne. Materials on building history under National Socialism . (= Writings of the NS Documentation Center of the City of Cologne. Volume 5). Emons Publishing House. Cologne 1998. ISBN 3-89705-103-6
  • Henriette Meynen (historical texts): List of monuments. 12.7 Cologne district 9 (Mülheim) Ed. Landeskonservator Rheinland, Rheinland Verlag, Cologne 1979, ISBN 3-7927-0461-7 , p. 68.
  • Spiertz, Willi: "We played ball and didn't have a ball". The post-war period in Cologne using the example of the Höhenhauser Finnenhaussiedlung Neue Heimat with memories from contemporary witnesses , Berlin 2012
  • Jürgen Wilhelm: The great Cologne Lexicon. (= Contributions to Cologne's history, language and character. Heimatverein Alt-Köln, Volume 77) Greven Verlag, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-7743-0355-X , p. 211.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Werner Heinen, Anne-Marie Pfeffer: Cologne: Siedlungen 1888-1988. (= Stadtspuren. Monuments in Cologne. Volume 10.1) JP Bachem, Cologne 1988, ISBN 3-7616-0929-9 , p. 298.
  2. ↑ Kier, Lieserfeld, Matzerath (ed.): Architecture of the 30s and 40s, p. 454 f.
  3. ^ Henriette Meynen (Historical Texts): List of Monuments. 12.7 Cologne district 9 (Mülheim) Ed. Landeskonservator Rheinland, Rheinland Verlag, Cologne 1979, ISBN 3-7927-0461-7 , p. 68.
  4. ↑ Kier, Lieserfeld, Matzerath (ed.): Architecture of the 30s and 40s, p. 455
  5. ↑ Werner Heinen: The Cologne settlements. In: Cologne-seine buildings 1928-1988. Published by the Cologne Architects and Engineers Association from 1875 in collaboration with the Cologne University of Applied Sciences, JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 1991, ISBN 3-7616-1074-2 , p. 372.
  6. ↑ http://www.ksta.de/servlet/OriginalContentServer?pagename=ksta/ksArtikel/Druckfassung&aid=1082385795605  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.ksta.de  
  7. ↑ Jörg Niendorf on the history of Finnish prefabricated housing estates in Germany on FAZ.Net.
  8. ↑ a b Finnensiedlung in Höhenhaus . In: KuLaDig, Kultur.Landschaft.Digital. (Accessed: January 24, 2019)

Web links

Commons : Finnensiedlung  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files


Coordinates: 50 ° 59 ′ 33.6 ″  N , 7 ° 2 ′ 31.2 ″  E