Falkenberg garden city

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The striking color is a special feature of the ink box settlement

The garden city of Falkenberg , also called Tuschkastensiedlung , is a housing estate in the Berlin district of Bohnsdorf in the Treptow-Köpenick district . In July 2008 it was included in the UNESCO list of world cultural heritage as one of six housing estates of Berlin Modernism .

The name is derived from the nearby mountain and has nothing to do with Falkenberg , a district in the Lichtenberg district .

planning

Terraced houses Gartenstadtweg

In 1912, the architect Bruno Taut was commissioned by the then Berliner Spar- und Bauverein (today: Berliner Bau- und Wohnungsgenossenschaft von 1892 eG) to build a 75 hectare site in the southeast of Berlin in today's Treptow-Köpenick district  , taking into account the local conditions to prepare a development plan as a hillside location. His overall plan for the Gartenstadt am Falkenberg in Bohnsdorf provided for around 1,500 apartments for around 7,000 residents. Following the example of English terraced houses, quarters with two-story rows should be strung together, which are staggered in rhythm with the rising topography . Each house should be given its own color and relate to the garden and public spaces.

The design of the outdoor and outdoor facilities was done by Berlin's first freelance garden architect, Ludwig Lesser , who had already made a name for himself with his social commitment and large-scale planning in Berlin and the surrounding area. Falkenberg was the first settlement in which the tenants' gardens were given such great importance that a garden architect was commissioned with the uniform planting of the up to 600 m² large plots. Espalier fruit , climbing plants, rows of trees and hedges skillfully accentuate the spatial structure of the area.

Facade design

realization

Memorial plaque on the house at Gartenstadtweg 53 in Bohnsdorf

Of the entire planning, only 34 apartments were realized in the first construction phase around the Akazienhof and 93 apartments in the second section on Gartenstadtweg, as economic difficulties and the First World War interrupted construction activity. These buildings are now a listed building .

After German reunification , the areas that were not used during the GDR era were returned to their original owners, the Berlin construction and housing cooperative in 1892. The Berlin architects Quick and Bäckmann emerged as the winner in a limited implementation competition, which was launched in 1992 by the Berlin Senate Department for Building and Housing for the 40 hectare fallow area . Their concept distanced itself from Taut's building program and interpreted the garden city idea in a contemporary form.

Structure and special features

Inkbox settlement Gartenstadtweg

What stands out is the intense color scheme, which has given the residential complex the nickname Tuschkastensiedlung . This colourfulness was in contrast to the prevailing principle under the influence of John Ruskin at the time that only the material colors were the “legitimate colors” of architecture. However, this meant that every more varied color scheme was tied to a corresponding use of material. Bruno Taut, on the other hand, made the color independent of the building material and thus created an effective and cheap means for a new type of design in residential construction.

The varied design of the streets and squares is remarkable. While other settlements of the time often appear monotonous due to the construction of many identical houses, Taut played with the axis of street and square. In the Akazienhof, for example, the head house is not centered, but shifted to the right to the street. The apartment building on the north-western side is set back a full length. The two entrance houses are neither in line with the adjacent rows of terraced houses nor with each other. This creates the impression of a "grown" farm.

Web links

Commons : Tuschkastensiedlung  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 52 ° 25 '  N , 13 ° 34'  E