Dutch Embassy Berlin
The Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Berlin is the diplomatic representation of the Netherlands , Arubas , Sint Maartens and Curaçaos in Germany. It is located at Klosterstrasse 50 on the Spree Canal in the Mitte district of the district of the same name . The current ambassador is Wepke Kingma .
Embassy building
From 1921 until the occupation of the Netherlands in World War II , the Dutch embassy was located around five kilometers to the west at Rauchstrasse 10 in the embassy district south of the zoo . It was adjacent to the building for the Norwegian Embassy , which was erected between 1940 and 1941 and was connected to it by a double arcade . The Dutch legation building was destroyed in World War II, its ( West Berlin ) property was sold in 1957 and an apartment building was built on in the 1980s. As a result of German reunification and the capital city resolution, there was a need for a representative embassy building in Berlin.
Following a Europe-wide tender, the Dutch architects Rem Koolhaas and Ellen van Loon were commissioned to design the design by the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in Rotterdam . In addition to the specifications of the client, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague , the strict urban planning regulations of the city of Berlin had to be met. After the Koolhaas House at Checkpoint Charlie, the embassy is the second Koolhaas building to be realized in Berlin.
The result was a total work of art that received international acclaim: an L-shaped building made of exposed concrete connects to the neighboring buildings and thus enables the cubic main structure to be exposed despite the surrounding block perimeter development. Aluminum and glass determine the external appearance of the building, which houses the “traject” inside, an staircase that winds through the whole building like an apple peel and ends on the roof. Another special feature is the “skybox” cantilever on the west front of the building with a view of the Spree , which serves as the ambassador's dining and meeting room.
The design for the embassy building was awarded the Berlin Architecture Prize 2003 and the Mies van der Rohe Award for European Architecture 2005.
The new embassy building was opened on March 2, 2004 by the Dutch Queen Beatrix and the Foreign Ministers Joschka Fischer (Germany) and Bernard Bot (Netherlands).
In the GDR , the embassy had its seat at Otto-Grotewohl-Strasse 5 from 1973 to 1990 (since 1993 Wilhelmstrasse 64).
See also
literature
- OMA and Francois Chaslin, The Dutch Embassy in Berlin by OMA / Rem Koolhaas , NAi Publishers, Rotterdam 2004, ISBN 978-90-5662-356-2 .
- Schimmelpenninck / Fournier: Dutch Embassy Berlin . Brochure (32 pages), ISBN 3-933743-93-1 ISBN 978-3-933743-93-0 .
- Sabine Quenot: The Amsterdam Feeling ( Memento from June 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) . In: “ The Parliament ”, No. 14/2006 of April 3, 2006.
Web links
- Website of the Dutch Embassy
- The embassy building on the website of the Dutch embassy
Individual evidence
- ^ Page of the Dutch Embassy, accessed on December 10, 2017
- ^ Telephone book for the capital of the German Democratic Republic Berlin. 1989 edition, p. 100
Coordinates: 52 ° 30 ′ 55 ″ N , 13 ° 24 ′ 43 ″ E