Description

The library at Berlin’s Hansaplatz has been a popular public amenity since it opened in the 1950s. The open-access library has no book stacks at all but is instead directly accessible from the U-Bahn allowing visitors the best possible, barrier-free access to books. When it was built, this kind of building was comparatively new, and no longer the reserve of the “educated classes”. People of all social backgrounds could reach the reading areas almost by chance via a covered connecting walkway. The transparency of the building, designed by Werner Düttmann, made it clear what to expect before entering. The restoration, completed in 2019 by the Berlin-based architecture conservation specialists adb and the garden conservation and landscape architecture office Dr Jacobs & Hübinger, faithfully restores its original appearance from the 1950s – or rather almost. All the surfaces have been cleaned, repainted or replaced to return them to their original state. For example, the slender steel profiles of the floor-to-ceiling glazing were preserved using a cavity cleaning method to remove rust from the inaccessible core.

In the children’s section, however, the architects were faced with a contradiction: prior to refurbishing, the rooms were fitted with green marbled linoleum, but Düttmann described the colour of the floor as “Chinese blue” in his plans. As it turned out, marbled linoleum only became available from 1958 onwards, and the architects therefore opted to restore the original blue floor again. For the wooden slats of the façade that were significantly weather-worn, the pine was replaced with more hard-wearing robinia wood (black locust) and colour matched to the reclaimed, aged pine of the non-exposed sections.

Although the concrete surfaces appear to have been restored to their former glory, the appearance is deceptive. The existing exposed concrete had been repaired several times before and was in a very poor condition. To restore the appearance of the original smooth concrete, slightly streaky and cloudy with small voids of air, the restorers used sponging, dabbing and speckling techniques when applying the protective surface filler to avoid the overly monochrome impression of a paint finish. A section of the original exposed concrete still existed in the adjoining U-Bahn station, which the architects used as their guide. It is debatable whether this trick constitutes the spirit of careful preservation, but it does certainly complement the original condition.

As the library concept was way ahead of its time and the presence of readers was as essential then as it is now, the basic concept did not need revising. The only real change was the conversion of the separate toilets for men and women into toilets for general use. A few computers and the electronic checkout are the only testimony to the technological advances over the years.

In the centre of the square building is a garden visible from every room of the library. A retractable window can be sunk into the floor by means of an electric motor and chain drive so that one can pass directly into the reading oasis with its pond from where one has a view out over the Tiergarten. The original situation was well documented but the landscape architects elected to restore the rows of paving slabs that replaced the earlier open planted joints in the 1970s. A bronze sculpture, entitled “Vegetative” made by Berhard Heiliger in 1955, has also been refurbished and stands flush on the ground as originally planned by Düttmann.

The Hansa Library is the centrepiece of the new residential quarter that was built in Berlin’s Tiergarten as part of the IBA in 1957. In 2012, an application was submitted for the inclusion of the (West Berlin) Hansa Quarter and the (East Berlin) Karl-Marx-Allee in the UNESCO World Heritage List. The application was not considered in 2014 and is to be resubmitted in 2022. The restoration project is a product of the ongoing commitment of the local citizens’ association Hansaviertel e.V. A change in the district administration that, together with the Senate Department for Urban Development and Housing managed to secure federal funding as part of the “National Projects of Urban Development 2015” programme as part of the “Hansaviertel Berlin – City of Tomorrow” project finally brought the project in motion. As a result, the Hansa Library has been spared the economisation measures that other district libraries are facing.

Originally published in Bauwelt 18.2020, pp. 32-37, abridged and edited for Building Types online, translated by Julian Reisenberger

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