Study House Düsseldorf

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Study House Düsseldorf
place Düsseldorf-Unterbilk
builder Bernhard Pfau
Construction year 1964-1967
demolition 1996/97
Coordinates 51 ° 12 '59.6 "  N , 6 ° 45' 48.5"  E Coordinates: 51 ° 12 '59.6 "  N , 6 ° 45' 48.5"  E

The study Haus Dusseldorf was a building in the Düsseldorf district of Unterbilk . It was built from 1964 to 1967 according to plans by the architect Bernhard Pfau . The aim was to combine various educational institutions spread across the city in one central location. In 1969 it was awarded by the Association of German Architects and in 1990 it was listed as a historical monument . Between December 1996 and March 1997 it was demolished in connection with the traffic and urban reorganization of the surrounding area.

Building description

The study house was at Fürstenwall 5, on the southern edge of downtown Düsseldorf, not far from the Rhine , near the port . Taking advantage of the prominent location of the assigned property, Bernhard Pfau managed to combine the required functions in a symbolic building . The executed design consisted of two interconnected building parts: a narrow, about 40 m high and 9 m wide high-rise slab with twelve storeys and a single-storey polygonal low-rise building in front . The compositional structure reflected the functional organization of the building: three lecture halls of different sizes were inscribed into the octagonal low-rise building. An exterior, fully glazed walkway connected the lecture halls with the foyer and the cafeteria including the terrace on the ground floor of the high-rise building . This resulted in a public area on the ground floor that could be used independently of the rest of the building. The upper floors of the high-rise slab accommodated the classrooms and a library. In the common basement there was an underground car park and workshops.

The skyscraper was oriented north-south and perpendicular to the river. It thus formed an urban spatial termination of the Düsseldorf bank of the Rhine in the south; at the same time, viewed from the south, it marked the entrance to the city along Rheinuferstraße. On its north side, a glass body protruded from the actual, massive disk over the entire height. This took up the access corridors of the one- level building and opened it up to the city and the river by means of a differently designed curtain wall . On the one hand, this allowed the users a panoramic view of the city, and on the other hand, the transparency of the study house in the evenings, when it was mainly used, guaranteed a widely visible presence in the city.

Not least by training as a high-rise, Pfau anchored the public institution ( adult education center ) confidently in the skyline and thus in the consciousness of the city. It complemented - as it were antithetical - the post-war silhouette on the Rhine , which was characterized by the high -rise administration buildings of the steel companies ( Mannesmann , architect: Schneider-Esleben , 1956–58, and Thyssen , architects: Hentrich, Petschnigg & Partner , 1955–60).

Situation today

Bürgerpark. In the background on the left the former location of the study house (2019)

Already at the end of the 1980s, after the original user, the adult education center, moved out, the demolition of the study building was discussed in connection with the reorganization of the surrounding area (new state parliament , reconstruction of the port, lowering of Rheinuferstraße). Nevertheless, the entry in the list of monuments was achieved in 1990.

With the completion of the so-called “ Stadttor ” high-rise (architect: Petzinka + Pink , 1992–98) and the establishment of a new park, the second phase of the redesign between the state parliament, the harbor and the city-gate high-rise began. As part of this planning, the study building was demolished after the last temporary tenant moved out in the winter of 1996/97, despite violent protests, although there were several interested parties for a subsequent use.

A competition was announced for the reorganization of the site, from which Döring, Dahmen, Joeressen emerged as the winner. The design contains a (residential) high-rise pane at the approximate location where the study house previously stood, expressly understood as a "homage" to the study house by Bernhard Pfau.

The city was ready to demolish a listed and fully functional public building in order to make room for the desired new planning, but without being able to convince the state, for example, to relocate the Landtag kindergarten, whose single-storey low-rise building now remains a corner of the new building area occupied. An existing multi-storey car park opposite the new state parliament could not be demolished either, as the owner refused. So the re-planning of the site remains incomplete and fragmentary to this day.

literature

Web links