House of Switzerland
The House of Switzerland is a commercial building in the Berlin district of Mitte . The location is Unter den Linden 24 / corner Friedrichstrasse 155/156. The building complex is now a listed building .
History and conception
The House of Switzerland was built according to plans by the Swiss architect Ernst Meier from Appenzell between 1934 and 1936 on behalf of the Schweizerische Bodenkreditanstalt. It is a steel frame building with natural stone cladding made of shell limestone , which corresponded to the architectural ideas of National Socialism . The design is based on the buildings of Ernst Sagebiel . There are round-arched colonnades on the ground floor . At the corner there is a Tell monument depicting Walther Tell, the son of the Swiss national hero Wilhelm Tell . The building was only slightly damaged in World War II . It is the only historical corner building that has been preserved at the intersection of Unter den Linden and Friedrichstrasse. After the war it belonged to East Berlin . During this time the building and the imperial courts were used by the German Foreign Trade Bank . The building remained in the possession of the Swiss bank during the GDR era.
Since the political turnaround , the building has been completely renovated and is now partially used as a hotel. AXA Versicherungen AG has owned the building since the Winterthur Group was dissolved .
literature
- Matthias Donath : Bunkers, banks, Reich Chancellery: Architectural Guide Berlin 1933–1945. Lukas-Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 978-3-936872-51-4 , pp. 36-37.
Web links
- Boy instead of revolutionary. In: Berliner Morgenpost from August 12, 2010, by Jörg Niendorf
- Luisenstadt educational association through the House of Switzerland
- Blog entry about the House of Switzerland
- Entry in the Berlin State Monument List
Coordinates: 52 ° 31 ′ 3 ″ N , 13 ° 23 ′ 19 ″ E