Hindenburgdamm 127-128

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Hindenburgdamm 127–128 in Berlin-Lichterfelde (2014)

The two apartment buildings at Hindenburgdamm 127/128 form a listed complex in the Berlin district of Lichterfelde . The buildings are listed under the object document number 09065866 in the monument database of the State of Berlin.

history

The two mirror-image houses were designed by the builder Walter Eichelkraut and built in 1902 and 1903 by the Müller & Schulze construction company. The client was the businessman Ernst Anyos, who purchased a former orchard on what was then Chausseestrasse as a building site and incorporated it into the design of the formerly parceled garden. Both this property as well as the adjacent properties were previously owned by a miller whose mill was on Karwendelstrasse (originally called Mühlenstrasse) and whose former house (built in 1866) is still adjacent to the back of the garden of House 128 at Hindenburgdamm . This historical starting situation has thus remained comprehensible to the present. The immediate effects of the Second World War on the fabric of the two houses at Hindenburgdamm 127/128 were minor. Significant alterations to the buildings took place in the 1970s and 1980s, with the original structure largely being retained. After several changes of ownership, the two houses are in different private ownership.

Literary processing

The building at Hindenburgdamm 128 is the setting for the plot of the novel Once Berlin, Simply (1991) by Sabine Brandt , who describes the life of the house residents in the first half of the 20th century in the context of contemporary history and also includes the surrounding district in the plot in great detail . The main character of the novel, Rose Markwart, was beyond literary studies, also the subject of currency historical studies, including in a dissertation. With reference to Sabine Brandt, the historical content of the characters and events described in the novel is emphasized.

Art-historical classification and meaning

The plasterer M. Krause provided the houses with rich facade decoration, which forms a transition between Neo-Baroque and Art Nouveau . Originally, the architect Eichelkraut was also supposed to take over the artistic design and presented a design that was strongly influenced by the neo-Gothic, but the client preferred the neo-baroque design by Krause. This division of labor between the architect and the plasterer is a special feature of both houses in terms of architectural history. The two buildings are outstanding examples of stately city villas as rental apartments for the Wilhelmine upper middle class around 1900 and are among the most distinctive and best-known houses on Hindenburgdamm.

Historic gardens

Just as the two houses at Hindenburgdamm 127 and 128 are mirror-inverted, the gardens in front of the houses were also largely congruent, resulting in a monumental ensemble along what was then Chausseestrasse. According to the descriptions and image sources that have been handed down, they were prime examples of Wilhelminian style garden architecture that fitted into the Lichterfelde villa colony , which is distinguished by its squares, flower beds, fountains and benches . The front gardens were used both for planting flowers and for growing vegetables. The arbors made of yasmin and hazelnut in the farthest corners of the gardens and the two pairs of hawthorns arranged to the right and left of the house entrances were characteristic. Other native and especially East Asian trees and shrubs enriched the botanical canon. The former symmetry was dissolved by several changes of ownership. In addition, there were impairments during the Second World War. In particular, the widening of the Hindenburgdamm in the 1970s led to the loss of around 5 meters of land facing the street. The shed fences (which were designed according to Karl Friedrich Schinkel's designs) were removed. The creation of walkable aisles through the property and the erection of simple fences changed the original effect. Since 2017, an explicit reconstruction of the historical garden has been started in front of the house at Hindenburgdamm 128. This approach is based on the detailed descriptions in the novel once Berlin, simply by Sabine Brandt and is based on drafts by the ethnologist Nils Seethaler , which, in addition to the novel, also include interviews with contemporary witnesses and historical photographs.

Personalities

In addition to the writer and journalist Sabine Brandt (1927–2018), the later SPD politician and educator Willi von Helden (1915–1988 ) grew up in the house at Hindenburgdamm 128 and lived there until he began his studies. His mother Anna lived as a widow on the second floor of the house until the middle of the 20th century and became the model for one of the characters in Brandt's novel Once Berlin, Simple . In the late 1960s, the ethnologist Kurt Krieger (1920–2007) (the director of the Berlin Völkerkundemuseum ) was often in the house (his parents lived on the first floor). The virologist Matthias Low (born 1958) lived long since the 1990s, several decades Beletage .

literature

  • Sabine Brandt: Once in Berlin, simply. Novel 1991.
  • Tillmann Heisterhagen / Rainer W. Hoffmann: teacher of the currency crisis. Three generations of families between Gold, Mark and Euro 2003
  • Sylvia Grabe: About dealing with money. Household and Family Financial Management 1998.
  • Sturm, Gesine: Berlin. Monument protection and preservation 2001.
  • Simon, Christian: Steglitz: Between idyll and metropolis. 2012
  • Erika Reinhold / Reinhard Ilgner: Lichterfelde. From the village to the suburb of Berlin. 2003.

Web links

Coordinates: 52 ° 26 ′ 3.8 ″  N , 13 ° 18 ′ 43.1 ″  E