New Lusthaus Berlin

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View of the new pleasure house in the electoral pleasure garden in Berlin-Cölln, the half-timbered building of the casting house cut in front . Detail from a view of Berlin by Jan Ruijscher .
The new Lusthaus (top left) in the Berlin plan by Johann Gregor Memhardt from 1652
The New Lusthaus designed by Johann Gregor Memhardt consisted of octagonal rooms.
View of the summer parade in Berlin's Lustgarten: on the right the new Lusthaus, which at that time already served as a stock exchange, in the middle the “new Packhof” (formerly: Orangery House). Copper engraving by Joh.Michael Probst from 1750.

The New Lusthaus was built around 1650 in the pleasure garden of the Berlin electoral (later royal) palace . Court society used it as a space for receptions and social events as well as for festivities, feasts or dance events. From 1739 it served as the house of the Berlin Stock Exchange . In 1798 the new pleasure house was torn down and replaced by a new stock exchange building.

Building history and equipment

At the time of the Thirty Years' War there was already an older pleasure house in the electoral palace garden , which became dilapidated and collapsed. The “new Lusthaus” in the Berlin Palace Gardens (“Lustgarten”) was built in the Dutch style around 1650 by Johann Gregor Memhardt on behalf of the Great Elector . At the same time, the pleasure garden was equipped with a Neptune fountain around this time.

The New Lusthaus consisted of two floors with four large octagonal halls each. It also had a roof terrace with a domed structure. In the middle of the four octagonal halls there was a square hall from which the halls were accessible. Two more square rooms surrounded the entrance, which was on the garden side. In the square room to the right of the entrance there was a spiral staircase that led to the upper floors and the roof terrace. A contemporary view of Berlin, which is attributed to the Dutch painter Jan Ruijscher, shows that the facade of the New Lusthaus was painted a subtle orange, from which the white painted windows contrasted decoratively.

A "decorated dining room" was located on the upper floor of the building. From the roof terrace above, covered with copper, one had a wide view on all sides.

The grotto

The ground floor was designed as an artificial grotto , with a collection of shells, corals, all sorts of stones and strange natural objects to decorate the ceiling and walls. The building was therefore also called "the grotto".

The stay in the grotto offered the visitor an overall experience that appealed to all senses. The grotto showed "on the inner side the Brandenburg eagle, which is made of sea shells in a grotto mosaic so skillfully that the desired colors are represented as if painted". Furthermore, “Moors” and “Satyrs” made of shells were to be seen on the walls. The fluting of birds was imitated by an artificially inflatable tube system. An artificial spray could be generated through tubes hidden in the ceiling, which could surprise unsuspecting visitors. Elsholtz describes the effect of a visit to the Lusthaus grotto as follows: “This way, eyes and ears are delighted here, and the nerves of feeling are also addressed. If you wish to have your body sprayed over by a sudden rain shower, just tell the overseer, and you can have a real artificial rain that pours on your head from all sides if you do not withdraw yourself quickly. "

Grotto master

For the grotto, “grotto masters” or “grotters” were required to design and maintain the facility. As specialists, they received high salaries. The first cave master of the New Lusthaus was David Psolimar , who had already been the electoral wax boss under Elector Georg Wilhelm and was now employed by the Great Elector in 1650 as a cave master with an annual salary of 368 thalers. He was followed in 1660 by Johann Baratta and in 1687 by his brother Franz. Johann Damnitz, who had been responsible for fountains and water arts since 1680, was also cave master in 1700. He received a salary of 550 thalers and later 250 thalers more, a very high salary. In this position he was followed in 1706 by the royal grotto Just Jakob Scheid and in 1709 by HS Schulze. With the dissolution of the pleasure garden in 1715, the office of master of the caves also ceased.

Wallpaper manufacture, stock exchange and sculptor's workshop

The pleasure house used as a stock exchange. Supplement to the Berlin city map by Johann David Schleuen from 1757.

As part of his efforts to use the space of the pleasure garden more practically, the soldier king Friedrich Wilhelm I left the ornate garden, which his grandfather, the Great Elector, and his father King Friedrich I had laid out in a sandy parade ground after 1713 (Paradeplatz ) transform. He left the New Lusthaus, where gallant festivities used to take place, to a French entrepreneur to set up a wallpaper factory. In 1720 a wash house was built next to the wallpaper factory, in which the royal underwear was washed.

With a cabinet decree of March 27, 1738, King Friedrich Wilhelm I finally transferred the New Lusthaus for their stock exchange transactions to the Berlin merchants, who had repeatedly asked him for suitable property. The first trading session took place on the upper floor of the Lusthaus on February 25, 1739. In 1747, a workshop for the royal sculptors was set up on the ground floor of the building, which was converted into a grotto. From 1775 the newly employed court sculptor Jean Pierre Antoine Tassaert used the studio.

Demolition and construction of a stock exchange building

In 1798 the “new pleasure house”, which had since become dilapidated, was demolished in favor of a new building for the stock exchange , which was built on the same site.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Johann Christian Gädicke: Lexicon of Berlin. Berlin 1806, p. 71 f.
  2. ↑ As a detail of the equestrian image of Elector Georg Wilhelm von Albrecht Christian Kalle shows, a smaller octagonal building already existed in the electoral pleasure garden around 1635. It is probably the aforementioned older pleasure house that became dilapidated and collapsed. Johann Gregor Memhardt probably based his redesign on this idea and also laid out the New Lusthaus octagonal, albeit much larger.
  3. ↑ Friedrich Nicolai: Description of the royal. Residence cities Berlin and Potsdam. Berlin and Stettin 1786, vol. 1, p. 74 f.
  4. ^ Johann Christian Gädicke: Lexicon of Berlin. Berlin 1806, p. 364
  5. ↑ cf. Online article: http://www.zlb.de/schlossplatz/geschichte/lustgarten.htm ( Memento from January 29, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  6. ↑ Folkwin Wendland: The Lustgarten at the Berlin Palace. In: Yearbook for Brandenburg State History. Vol. 20 (1969), p. 107.
  7. ↑ Folkwin Wendland: The Lustgarten at the Berlin Palace. In: Yearbook for Brandenburg State History. Vol. 20 (1969), p. 119 f.

literature

  • Johann Christian Gädicke: Lexicon of Berlin. Berlin 1806.
  • Albrecht Geyer: History of the palace in Berlin. Berlin 1936 (two volumes). New edition (of volumes 1 and 2 in one book) by Nicolaische Verlagsbuchhandlung GmbH, Berlin 2010. ISBN 978-3-89479-628-0 .
  • Friedrich Nicolai: Description of the royal. Residence cities Berlin and Potsdam. Berlin and Stettin 1786. Three volumes.
  • Folkwin Wendland: The pleasure garden at the Berlin Palace. In: Yearbook for Brandenburg State History. 20: 94-139 (1969).

Coordinates: 52 ° 31 ′ 12 ″  N , 13 ° 24 ′ 0 ″  E