Press ESC to close

Germany

0

PHOTO GALLERY: GROßER HEINEBERG

The Großer Heineberg is a 56-meter hill in Potsdam-Bornim (peak at 52.435010, 12.988588, map below). After WWII it was used as a dump for building materials, and while the vegetation has generally made a comeback the soil is still filled with pieces of brick, tile, and glass, with larger piles of rubble appearing frequently.

John Peck
Continue Reading
0

INTERVIEW: JAMES J. CONWAY OF RIXDORF EDITIONS

FOUNDED IN BERLIN in 2017, Rixdorf Editions is an independent press dedicated to publishing neglected German texts of the late 19th and early 20th century in new English translations. In focusing on previously untranslated works of the pre-Weimar “Wilhelmine” era, the press sheds light on a literary era that is often overlooked, despite having produced writing as startlingly creative and groundbreaking – if not more so – than the more famous movements that would follow.

John Peck
Continue Reading
0

ZACHELSBERG: POTSDAM’S ABANDONED SHOOTING RANGE

THOUGH THERE ARE dozens of locations in greater Potsdam with “Berg” (literally “mountain”, though often applied to much more modest hills) in their names, the region is overwhelmingly rural, flat, and agrarian. Nonetheless, even among the sprawling corn and alfalfa fields and winding highways of Potsdam Nord, occasional clusters of hills reach high enough altitudes to be notable.

John Peck
Continue Reading
0

BERLIN U-BAHN ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN MAP

Blue Crow Media, perhaps the foremost current publisher of city maps focused on modernist architecture, returns with the Berlin U-Bahn Architecture and Design Map. Like the previous entries in their series showcasing the architectural highlights of urban transit systems – London, New York, Paris, Moscow – the Berlin entry is attractively printed on thick, sturdy paper with a die-cut slipcase.

Also like the publisher’s previous offerings (including the Brutalist Berlin Map and the Pyongyang Architectural Map), the emphasis is less on wayfinding and more on presenting a minimalist and straightforward overview of the city’s architectural highlights. Rather than throwbacks to a purely analog era, where maps had to be followed street by meticulously detailed street, Blue Crow creates physical maps that are intended for the 21st century, in that they offer a clean, simple overlay of a city while leaving much of the work of navigation and transit connections to our ever-present smartphones. This stripped-down approach allows each map to focus on the essentials without getting bogged down in cartographic details that would likely be made redundant by modern technology.

John Peck
Continue Reading
0

PHOTO GALLERY: SONAMBIENTE BERLIN TXL

From August 12 – September 5, 2021, the sound festival Sonambiente took over Berlin’s recently decommissioned Tegel Airport (TXL). Various sound-based installations took over the airports corridors, gates, and waiting rooms. As the airport saw its final flight in November 2020, and was fully decommissioned in May 2021, the building remained relatively intact, though informational signs and installed businesses (such as in-terminal restaurants) had been deconstructed, and some of the exterior facades had begun to show signs of wear.

John Peck
Continue Reading
0

BUNKERS IN THE SKY: THE BRUTALIST BERLIN MAP

WE’VE COVERED BLUE Crow Media’s collection of Modernist Maps in the past, including an overview of the series and a look at their remarkable Pyongyang Architecture Map. Their newest addition, the Brutalist Berlin Map, joins London, Paris, Sydney, Boston and Washington in their sub-series on Brutalism, and serves as a fitting companion to 2016’s Modern Berlin Map. This newest map repeats some of the structures from its Modernist counterpart, which is to be expected given the implied Venn diagram that maps the ever-shifting overlap of Brutalism and Modernism: the Mäusebunker, Corbusierhaus, Akademie der Künste, the Czech Embassy, among others. Ultimately, while each map has more than enough unique entries to act as a standalone guide, the combination of the two offers even greater opportunities for exploration, as well as a perfect jumping-off point for further discussion.

John Peck
Continue Reading