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Berlin has become the first city in Germany in which rent-control legislation has come into force in a bid to put the breaks on some of the fastest rising rents in Europe.
From Monday, landlords in the capital will be barred from increasing rents by more than 10% above the local average. Such controls were already in place for existing tenants but have now been extended to new contracts.
“[...] the difference between the rent paid in existing contracts and new contracts is so high [...]”
— theguardian.com
Axel Bering and Michael Jacobi, the main investors behind the Prora project, claim they could not care less about a building once being dedicated to Hitler. [...]
He and his partner, Michael Jacobi, both confess that because they had to comply with German regulations, their investment carries some Third Reich architecture qualities. They did, however, add a balcony, but otherwise they see Prora as a nice beach town and a solid investment.
— thedailybeast.com
Artist impressions of various sections of the Prora colossus and their new make-up (source: Seebad Prora):Previously View full entry
Thousands of Bauhaus buildings are concentrated in a central district of Tel Aviv, called the "White City." It became a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2003.
These houses were built by Jewish architects who fled Nazi Germany and emigrated to what was the British Mandate of Palestine at the time. They designed their houses according to the principles developed by Walter Gropius [...]
Germany plans to invest 2.8 million euros ($3.2 million) to help preserve the cultural heritage.
— dw.de
Seventy years after the end of the war, Berlin is finally filling the last gaps left by Allied bombs, which destroyed more than two-thirds of the buildings in the city center. Architects say the construction boom offers Berlin a chance to make up for decades of bad planning and mediocre architecture. “This is a new time in Berlin,” says Libeskind [...]. “It’s one of the great cities of the world, and we expect it to compete. We don’t expect it to be some backwater.” — bloomberg.com
Previously:OMA wins Axel Springer Berlin HQ competitionBerlin's Alexanderplatz high-rise developments continue to take shapeLondon’s architecture lacks Berlin’s sense of culture, says ChipperfieldBerlin After the Wall: A Microcosm of the World’s Chaotic Change View full entry
When I speak with a student about nightlife they have something different in mind than a 65-year old town planning manager. In the municipalities, finding contacts is difficult - often nobody feels responsible or capable of speaking. That should change. — DW.de
There are sleepy cities and cities that never sleep. There are cities famed for their raucous nightlife, and others whose adolescent residents dream of leaving. According to the German urban scientist Jakob F. Schmid, interviewed for DW.DE, "Nightlife often defines the character of entire streets... View full entry
Built by the Third Reich in the run-up to World War II, the Strength Through Joy resort was a Nazi vision of tourism’s future. Happy, healthy Aryans would stay and play at the 10,000-room complex on the Baltic Sea, eating, swimming and even bowling for the Führer. Think Hitler’s Cancun.
[...] a group of investors in this seaside town is now doing what the Nazis never could: realizing the site’s final stage of transformation into a vacation wonderland.
— washingtonpost.com
Previously View full entry
Sports brand giant Adidas recently selected the COBE-led consortium to design the Adidas "Meet & Eat", a new public conference center at the Adidas Group's World of Sports headquarters in Herzogenaurach, Germany...The 11,000 m2 building has an open, clean design that complements and embraces its natural surrounding landscape. Aside the hints of Adidas' insignia through the interior, the "striped" pattern of the roof also seems to subtly nod to the brand's triple-stripe mark. — bustler.net
Not far from the Brandenburg Gate, Potsdamer Platz was a no man’s land during the Cold War. Then the Berlin Wall fell, and the German authorities made it a petting zoo for celebrity architecture. The corporate headquarters of Germany’s new global swagger.
But the ambitions for Potsdamer Platz, like the hopes and fears about a united Germany, turned out differently. The architecture was not so great. Many companies fled.
— nytimes.com
Related: 8,000 Glowing Balloons Recreate the Berlin Wall View full entry
Luxury brand Porsche Design recently launched a closed invite-only competition to find the architect for their Porsche Design Tower in Frankfurt, Germany. The winning proposal will have the most fitting urban architectural concept along with ideas for the surrounding outdoor spaces. The project will be Porsche's debut in real estate in Europe. — bustler.net
Out of a goal of 20 participating architecture teams, the first six firms to compete are: Delugan Meissl Associated Architects, Vienna (Austria) 3XN, Copenhagen (Denmark) Neutelings Riedijk Architecten, Rotterdam (The Netherlands) Stefano Boeri Architetti, Milan... View full entry
The first blows to bring down the Berlin Wall were struck nearly 25 years ago to the day. This was after almost three decades of the concrete barricade cutting through the heart of Berlin and splitting the city in two. Today, Berlin is once again divided, this time by an 11-foot-tall wall of illuminated balloons.
The Lichtgrenze (translation: “border of light”) will stretch for 10 miles along the same path as the original 96-mile structure.
— wired.com
Movies can be great. Art can be great. But put them together in a museum exhibition, and the combination can be not-so-great. [...]
A new exhibition of early 20th-century cinema at the L.A. County Museum of Art (LACMA), however, rethinks that equation. [...]
Designed by Amy Murphy, a professor of architecture at USC, and Michael Maltzan of Michael Maltzan Architecture, the exhibition design is the antithesis of the traditional framed-stuff-on-a-wall model.
— latimes.com
Crafty space manipulator Luftwerk will showcase FLOW/Im Fluss, a nightly light and water installation at Chicago's Couch Place alley on September 17-20 from 5 p.m. to midnight. Luftwerk, the Chicago-based collaborative established by Petra Bachmaier and Sean Gallero, is best known for their... View full entry
The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat gave their 10 Year Award to JAHN's Post Tower out of seven finalists. The award recognizes a tall building that has best proven successful performance in various criteria over a timespan of at least 10 years since the building's completion. — bustler.net
Located in Bonn, Germany, the 163-meter Post Tower office building made itself known as one of the world’s lowest energy-consuming tall buildings and a predecessor to sustainable tower design.More details on Bustler. View full entry
The world championship for the "72 Hour Interactions" realtime competition is taking place in Witten, Germany later this month! For 72 intense hours starting July 23 at 6 p.m., five international teams will venture out and transform Witten's neglected public sites through nothing other than creativity and architectural design — while having fun in the process. — bustler.net
Each team will represent one of the cities in the Ruhr valley: Hagen, Hattingen, Herdecke, Wetter and Witten. Sixty participants from abroad and from the region will transform neglected sites throughout the city through means of what the competition organizers describe as "gameful architectural... View full entry
The most striking Bauhaus designs, such as Marcel Breuer's tubular steel chair or the Wagenfeld table lamp, have been endlessly copied and mass produced.
But the architecture of the design school has left a more complicated legacy in Germany.
[...] reopens two of the art school's most significant houses on Friday, almost 70 years after they were bombed, the move is sure to reignite the old debate about what to do with historic buildings damaged during the second world war.
— theguardian.com