Westbad (Leipzig)

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Westbad construction site, 1929

The Westbad is a former swimming pool in the Leipzig district of Lindenau , which was built by Hubert Ritter between 1928 and 1930 and today serves as a multi-purpose building and event location . The building in the tradition of a public bath is an important example of the new building in Leipzig.

history

The designs for the Westbad come from the then Leipzig city ​​planning officer Hubert Ritter, who also took over the construction management . An area of ​​around 9,000 square meters between Odermannstrasse and Marktstrasse in Leipzig-Lindenau was chosen as the location. The excavation work began on August 1, 1928, and the actual construction work on the foundation began on October 18 of the same year . The house was opened in August 1930 and the construction costs amounted to three million Reichsmarks . The indoor pool was available for both leisure activities and sports competitions . In addition to a large 25-meter swimming pool with diving towers , the building also contained a teaching pool, shower baths, a medical bathing section, a gymnastics area and a sauna area .

Westbad as seen from the Lindenauer Markt, 2015

The first competitions in various disciplines (individual courses in swimming and diving , swimming relays) took place from October 4th to 5th, 1930 in the main pool. The invitation of the gymnastics and sports community in 1848 Lindenau to the 2nd Goetz swim in Leipzig to honor Ferdinand Goetz was followed by 40 local gymnastics and sports clubs . The German swimmer Gisela Schöbel-Graß set a new world record in the Westbad on May 9, 1943 over 100 meters chest on the short course. With a time of 01: 19.80 minutes she was the first swimmer in the world to stay below the time of 1:20 minutes.

From the 1950s and 1960s, the bath was also used to train students at the DHfK Leipzig and the local ballet school. During this time, the spectator seats were expanded by installing a provisional wooden stand at ground level. In 1989, public bathing in the Westbad was stopped. In the first half of the 1990s, several photo series drew attention to the increasing decay of the Westbad, including by Harald Kirschner . In 1993, the author and publicist Karsten Kruschel suggested that the house be redesigned on four levels into a fun and leisure pool with a hotel and restaurant. From the year 2000, a project team in cooperation with the city of Leipzig created a concept for the continued use of the building. In 2004, the reconstruction of the facades and the interior work began. Today the building on the Odermannstrasse side with the disused large pool serves as an event center, on the Marktstrasse side as a location for smaller companies, the former teaching pool is still used. From July 2019 to November 2020, the Westbad is used as an interim for musical comedy , the operetta theater has 480 seats in the hall of the former large pool.

Structural description of the historic bath

The soberly designed, reinforced concrete building has four floors , the ground floor and three upper floors. The main facade on Odermannstrasse is only provided with a row of windows at ground level, above which it is closed. The reason for this design of the facade was the fear that the low evening sun could dazzle the visitors of the bath, at the same time the front served as a soundproofing against the street noise . After the opening of the house, this clinker brick facade became popularly known as the Western Wall , and the building was also called the Lindenauer Jerusalem . The origin of the term Wailing Wall was the poem of a reader of the Neue Leipziger Zeitung , which was published on November 24, 1929 under the title Wailing Wall of Lindenau .

The central entrance was, among other things, with a large entrance hall , changing rooms and access to the stairwell on the Marktstrasse side of the Lindenauer Markt . On the ground floor there were three separate entrances for bathers, school classes and spectators , and a large shed window was installed to illuminate the entrance hall . Large, inclined glass panes ensured natural light penetration into the vestibule. The ground floor and the floors above were visually separated from each other by clinker bricks of different colors.

In the base of the building, about two meters below street level, there was a teaching pool measuring 8 × 18 meters. The main pool on the first floor was 25 meters long; three diving towers (one 3-meter tower and two 1-meter towers) were installed next to starting blocks . Along the pool there were spectator galleries on three levels, on these sides the large pool was equipped with large and almost glare-free windows, which, however, could not be seen from the two street fronts, as they were located in the south and east facade facing the inner courtyard . The smaller teaching pool was directly below the shallow area of ​​the large pool; when swimming and jumping competitions were held in the latter, water was pumped from the small pool into the main pool in order to achieve the necessary water depth there. On the top two floors in the direction of Marktstrasse, 64 bathtubs , 18 shower baths and the sauna and gymnastics areas were housed , among other things, separated by gender .

The clock tower or clock tower can also be found on Marktstrasse, which closes the building to the north and shapes the overall image of the Lindenauer Markt. The cubic design language of the Westbad is recognizable from the horizontally and vertically protruding part of the building.

literature

  • The West indoor swimming pool will be ready soon. In: Neue Leipziger Zeitung. May 22, 1929.
  • A new "sight" of Leipzig. In: Neue Leipziger Zeitung. November 24, 1929.
  • Karsten Kruschel: A fun and leisure pool for Leipzig. Ideas for the future of the Westbad. In: Building - Living - Leisure. The regional trade journal. Leipzig and the region. 2, No. 3, 1993, pp. 8-23.
  • Harald Kirschner: The Westbad - an inventory. In: Life in Lindenau. A series of publications by PRO Leipzig. 1, 1993, pp. 48-53.
  • Dieter Schiffcyk: The buildings of the health system and sports by Hubert Ritter. In: Hubert Ritter and the architecture of the twenties in Leipzig. (= Series of publications for building culture, architecture, monument preservation. Series A - Monographs 1). Saxon State Ministry of the Interior, Dresden 1993, ISBN 3-930380-00-5 , pp. 34–38, 96–98.
  • Dieter Schiffcyk: The Westbad. In: Life in Lindenau. A series of publications by PRO Leipzig. 3, 1996, pp. 52-53.
  • Falko Grubitzsch: What will happen to the Westbad? Thoughts on building history and the prospects of a valuable cultural monument. In: Leipziger Blätter. No. 34, 1999, pp. 40-42.
  • Leipzig goes swimming. From the Pleißestrand to the New Lakeland. Edited by the Friends of the Saxon Sports Museum and the Leipzig City History Museum / Leipzig Sports Museum. PRO Leipzig, Leipzig 2004, ISBN 3-936508-06-2 , pp. 134-138.

See also

Web links

Commons : Westbad  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Dieter Schiffcyk 1993, p. 37.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g Leipzig goes swimming. 2004, p. 134.
  3. ↑ The indoor swimming pool West will be finished soon. 1929.
  4. ↑ Falko Grubitzsch 1999, p. 40.
  5. ↑ Leipzig goes swimming. 2004, p. 136.
  6. ↑ Harald Kirschner 1993.
  7. ↑ Karsten Kruschel 1993.
  8. ^ Westbad Leipzig. Westbad Entwicklungs- und Betriebsgesellschaft mbH, accessed on July 20, 2018 .
  9. ↑ Water world in the Westbad. Retrieved July 20, 2018 .
  10. ↑ Peter Korfmacher: “What is possible with 7.6 million”. From July, the MuKo auditorium will be completely rebuilt and the Westbad will be used as an alternative venue . In: Leipziger Volkszeitung from January 25, 2019, p. 9.
  11. ↑ a b Falko Grubitzsch 1999, p. 41.
  12. ↑ A new "sight" of Leipzig. In: Neue Leipziger Zeitung. November 24, 1929.
  13. ↑ Dieter Schiffcyk 1993, p. 38.
  14. ↑ Leipzig goes swimming 2004, p. 137.

Coordinates: 51 ° 20 ′ 12.3 "  N , 12 ° 20 ′ 2.3"  E