House at Checkpoint Charlie

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House at Checkpoint Charlie, 2012

The Haus am Checkpoint Charlie is a building originally designed as a residential building at Friedrichstrasse 43 in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg . The building was constructed from 1985 to 1986 based on a design by Peter Eisenman as part of the 1987 International Building Exhibition and is considered one of his main works.

Conception and creation

The building was originally built for social housing in Berlin . The building was designed by the American architect Peter Eisenman, who was part of the New York Five architectural group . The house at Checkpoint Charlie, along with the memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe, is one of his most famous works in Germany. The building was named after the neighboring Checkpoint Charlie , a border crossing between the two German states that was made necessary by the Berlin Wall . Today the building houses the Wall Museum.

The appearance of the house at Checkpoint Charlie lives from the interplay of different square grids, the meridian and the street . As the property is located near two different urban patterns and former city walls - the excise wall and the Berlin wall - the red band in the facade symbolizes the 19th century, the gray band the 20th century and the white grid the Mercator Projection of the globe. Originally, a garden was also to be built according to plans by Eisenman, but this was no longer realized after the fall of the Berlin Wall .

Wall Museum

The Wall Museum , which documents the history and events of the Berlin Wall , escapes and the worldwide non-violent struggle for human rights , is located in the building at Checkpoint Charlie. It was founded in 1962 by Rainer Hildebrandt , a resistance fighter against National Socialism . It is one of the most visited museums in Germany. The director of the museum is Alexandra Hildebrandt .

See also

Web links

Coordinates: 52 ° 30 '24.8 "  N , 13 ° 23' 26.4"  E