Description

To fulfil its role as a mediator between the baroque Brühl Terrace to the west and the slab blocks from GDR times to the east, the site had to establish a clear division between the “good” urban grain of the older buildings and the “poor” urban grain of the more modern buildings whilst simultaneously respecting the lie of the existing structures. The long narrow site – 110 metres long in a north-south direction and 26 metres wide – nevertheless opens more to the west than the east, a traffic artery cutting through the urban structure on the east towards the river Elbe.

Between the volumes of the synagogue and the community centre, which are located at either end of the site, lies a courtyard. On this raised plateau, 16 plane trees are arranged in a square – at once an extension of the Brühl Terrace and a place for celebrating Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles, which takes place in autumn. Here, an area of coarsely crushed glass marks the footprint of the old synagogue built by Gottried Semper in the sand. Both the larger more introverted synagogue and the smaller more extroverted community centre are clad in the same material: 120 by 60 by 60 centimetre blocks made of a composite of cement, limestone, sand, quartz and yellow pigment. This artificial stone resembles the traditional Elbe sandstone but does not darken as markedly. The dimensions of the new synagogue – 26 by 24 by 24 metres – give it the appearance of a cube. In actual fact, the walls twist outwards and inwards. Each course of blockwork – each rectangular in shape – is rotated slightly layer for layer until the uppermost layer faces due east. This torsion is also evident from inside as the walls are not covered and the services are concealed in channels within the blockwork.

In the centre of the austere space stands a large rectangular insertion clad in horizontal panels of oiled oak. At its shorter west face, this house inside a house serves as a gallery, at the east end it contains the Torah shrine and an organ. The pews are arranged around the bimah, which is illuminated from above by a coffered roof-light in the concrete ceiling. Suspended from the roof from cables are steel rods which bear a veil-like curtain that reaches the floor on the north and south sides. These partially plain, partially decorated strips – a textile made of brass – have a most ceremonious character, defining a space within the space of the synagogue as if enclosed by a heavenly baldachin.

The interpretation of the spatial qualities of the Jewish ritual from before the Diaspora, and its location at the edge of the old city before and after the Shoah, are its greatest qualities. The external walls of the synagogue refer to the biblical Temple of Solomon, the internal baldachin to the biblical tabernacle. The skewed form of the building, so “perfectly succinct”, strives and falls, leans and topples, as if symbolising the continual resistance and capitulation experienced by the Jewish community over the centuries.

 

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Originally published in: Rudolf Stegers, Sacred Buildings: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2008.