University of Massachusetts Amherst From the SelectedWorks of Annaliese Bischoff Fall 1993 The nbuiU lt Prinz-Albrecht-Palais Competition Annaliese Bischoff Available at: https://works.bepress.com/annaliese_bischoff/11/ Review Reviewed Work(s): GERMANY: DESIGN The Unbuilt Prinz-Albrecht-Palais Competition by Review by: Annaliese Bischoff Source: Landscape Journal, Vol. 12, No. 2 (Fall 1993), pp. 215-222 Published by: University of Wisconsin Press Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43324106 Accessed: 06-01-2020 16:39 UTC JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms University of Wisconsin Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Landscape Journal This content downloaded from 128.119.168.112 on Mon, 06 Jan 2020 16:39:17 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms media, to be more ecologically respon- sible. But, because I am one of those people who like intervening, I have been struggling with the relationship of ecological parameters to form making. From this struggle comes my interest in the rough and refined - the dialectic based in the sublime and the beautiful. But where does our profession sit, poised to be part of the future? The current German model as I experienced it is not the solution. They have embraced ecology at the expense of design intervention. We need both. I was especially struck by the lack of design theory in the university programs. I personally do not sepa- rate the processes of decision making between scales. In other words, envi- ronmental and regional planners (who may work at 1 :50,000) require the same basic understanding of landscape theory as does the urban designer (who may work at 1:50). And vice versa. It is perhaps the separa- tion and "streaming" of these two Figure 1. Site location within the district of Kreuzberg in Berlin. aspects of landscape architecture that is detrimental to what our profession offers. Graduates of most planning schools in Canada can offer little ex- Weizsäcker, announced an open com- Notes: perience and knowledge about physi- petition for the former Prinz-Albrecht- Palais site in Berlin's district of Kreuz- cal planning. Landscape architects, 1 . Cordula Reisch Loidl, Der Hang zur Verwil- derung (Vienna: Picus Verlag, 1986). on the other hand, find their exper- berg in an area known as southern 2. Daniel Libeskind, "The Visible in the Invisi- Friedrichstadt (Figure 1) on a 6.2- tise in "site," "landscape," and "phys- ble," in Wunden Braunkohlebrachen zwischen Woer- ical reality." litz und Bitterfeld, edited by Wehberg, Hinnerk, hectare (or 15.5-acre) site adjacent to There is the perennial problem Weisbach, and Rainer (Braunschweig: Tech- the Wall. The competition sponsored nische Universitaet, 1991). of trying to do too much in any pro- by the mayor would be executed by 3. Libeskind, p. 25. the Internationale Bauausteilung fessional education program. And of 4. Libeskind, p. 26. course there is much divergence of 5. Patrick M. Condon, and Patrick F. Mooney, (IBA), the International Building opinion on what is "core" to a land- in program-planning documents for the U.B.C. Exhibition. With the target year of scape architect's education and prac- Landscape Architecture Program, 1992. the "Fest," 1987, Berlin's 750th an- tice. It does seem, however, that a niversary, IBA was already launching a monumental effort to demonstrate • strong link must be made between Moura Quayle is Associate Professor, the "sustainability of form" and the Landscape Architecture Program , Univer- the livability of the city through 6,000 "form of sustainability."5 Somehow sity of British Columbia , Vancouver, British new and rehabilitated dwelling units our teaching and practice must begin Columbia, Canada. designed by selected international to better integrate these concepts. and local professionals. The approach of IBA was twofold: first, to relate ar- GERMANY: DESIGN The Unbuilt chitecture (past, present, and future) to the existing city and, second, to Prinz-Albrecht-Palais Competition, Berlin: Results to Remember celebrate the "polycentric" nature of Berlin, with an emphasis on the char- Annaliese Bischoff acter of each area. Southern Frie- drichstadt was one area particularly Introduction and Context in need; Davey and Clelland (1987) have described this area as the "long strip of bombed and brutalized (by In mayor mayor June of ofBerlin, of Berlin, Richard 1983 von the Richard reigning von later planning) inner urban territory Reports 215 This content downloaded from 128.119.168.112 on Mon, 06 Jan 2020 16:39:17 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms and symmetrical formal baroque- style grounds. Lenné proposed an asymmetrical scheme with curvilinear walkways for strolling in an English landscape style. The landscape archi- tect Günther Harri (1984) has de- scribed this garden park in its genre as one of Lenné's best. Also of signifi- cance to the built environment is the Kunstgewerbemuseum, the Industrial Arts Museum, or the Gropiusbau, de- signed by Martin Gropius and Heino Schmieden (1877-1881). Of architec- tural interest is Otto Firle's 1924 pro- posal to renovate the Europahaus building to the west on the site in contrast to the way it was actually allowed to be completed in 1931. Firle's scheme had to meet Albert Speer's approval with Hitler's mission (IBA 1983). This points to the real significance of this site. Despite the merits of its 19th and 20th century landscape architecture and architec- ture, the site's history is almost com- pletely overshadowed by its subse- quent occupation by the SS, the Gestapo, and the Security Service of the Third Reich (Figure 2). My point is not so much that the other works are insignificant, but that the unprec- edented horrors of Nazism render all Figure 2. Site plan showing the Gestapo occupation, 1935. normal criteria for comparison inap- propriate. So it seems critical to de- scribe the Nazi use of this site in cut off from the 'Stadtmitte,' by the ments will be described: (1) the sig- more detail. violent intrusion of the Wall." nificance of the site's history, (2) the From 1928 to 1931 the Reich However, the Prinz-Albrecht- precompetition efforts, (3) the com- government rented out the Prinz- Palais competition would be unlike petition results, (4) its aftermath, Albrecht-Palais as a place for its any other IBA executions, regardless and (5) recent thoughts. A personal guests. In 1932 Goebbels moved the of their district location. Many IBA critique of the competition, its results, editorial offices of the party paper, competitions and projects have been and significance will be offered in Der Angriff (the Assault), into 106 realized, including a new residential conclusion. Wilhelmstrasse. In 1933 the Geheime project across the street from the Staatspolizei (the Secret State Police), palais site. But the Prinz-Albrecht Histoňc Significance of the Site under Himmler, moved into the Kunst- competition results would never be The site is historically signifi- gewerbeschule (the Industrial Arts realized. Coming to terms with the cant because of its former palais, School) between the Gropiusbau and particular historic fabric on this site which Prince Albrecht commissioned the palais. In 1934 the palais became proved to be very controversial. Yet Karl Friedrich Schinkel to renovate the headquarters of the Sicherheits- this competition may well be one of (1830-1832). SchinkeFs main changes dienst (the Security Service) of the the most important in Germany in to the palais included an elegant SS (the Schutzstaffel or Protection this century. The purpose of this colonnade with two gateways connect- Squadron) under the command of paper is to acquaint a largely Ameri- ing the street front to the back gar- Reinhard Heydrich (Aronson 1962). can and Canadian professional audi- den. He also added a second story to In 1939 the palais housed the newly ence with this competition. In this the side wings of the palais (Sievers created Reichssicherheitshauptamt investigation, the history of the site 1954). Notable as well were the gar- (the Reich Security Main Office). and the competition will be reviewed. den park plans from 1830 and 1835 Ernst Kaltenbrunner resided here Through a study of original documents, from Peter Josef Lenné. His proposals until the end of the war. This was also extensive publications, site observa- doubled the size of the previous axial Adolf Eichmann's workplace. At this tion, and interviews with selected site, then, was a chilling concentra- competition participants, five ele- tion of power and terror. Here the 216 Landscape Journal This content downloaded from 128.119.168.112 on Mon, 06 Jan 2020 16:39:17 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms plans were made, here the orders building-material firm processed rub- objectives of the competition were, were given for the systematic murder ble in the northeast portion of the first, to create a place of remem- of millions. Victims were brought to site. In the southeast the site was brance about the history of the site this site, detained, tortured, and then turned into an Autodrome, where and, second, to provide the residents most often murdered at other sites in those without a driving license could of Kreuzberg with a park (IBA 1985). the Konzentrationslager, specifically pay a small fee to drive madly along There were 493 requests for designed for mass annihilation.