BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) named Berlin a "City of Design" in their "Global Alliance's Creative Cities Network" in 2005. The city does not share this distinction with its older, more distinguished European counterparts, but instead, alongside Buenos Aires in Argentina and Montreal in Canada. It therefore begs the question: what makes Berlin standout in terms of design?

Founded in 1237CE, one could argue that amongs t t he re s t o f t he Eu ropean metropolises, Berlin can be categorized as one of the younger cities; however, the nearly eight centuries worth of history the city has amassed argues otherwise. The city has seen empires, wars, and immense innovation on its own soil and to consider it young feels almost counterintuitive. Yet standing in the center of Potsdamer Platz, it becomes apparent that the intersection embodies the convergence of history and modernity: the dichotomy that shapes the Berlin identity and pushes the city forward.

The German capital’s dynamic experience offers its citizens today a rich history, but this history comes along with the excess baggage that people would rather forget. The tumultuous events that the city experienced during the 20th century affected the physical landscape of the capital. During WWII, buildings were bombed out and the city lost 3 million of its citizens to the Holocaust; post-WWII the wall dissected and scarred the city, creating two distinctly different Berlin identities. In his book Ghosts of Berlin, Brian Ladd talks a great deal about memory, and at one point he refers to the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, stating that “[Nietzsche] argued that only the ability to forget makes creative action possible. In short, if [one] cannot select certain facts from history and discard others, [one] will never have any beliefs firm enough to act on” (Ghosts, Ladd 11).

An Investigation into Berlinʼs Culture of Design by Schuyler Pham

The act of removing certain elements and rebuilding others is quite apparent when observing the cityscape. Today, some of the grandiose architecture from Friedrich the Great’s empire is missing, having been removed by the GDR government; likewise, only the skeleton of the GDR parliament building stands as cranes are working to remove the blight from the Berlin landscape. There are facets of the Berlin history that people feel are better off left out of the cityscape and forgotten in history. However, is it really the act of forgetting that is shaping the city’s identity? Nietszche’s argument reminds me of a quote from Cicero in which he states, “To not know what happened before one was born is to remain a child.” The city of Berlin and its people have experienced a turbulent history that has shaped their collective identity; to forget it would be a shame and one could argue that the design that is cultivated in the city today and in years past would not be in existence without its history. Certainly there are certain aspects of the city and its history that are being carried forth into the future while others are not, but the argument should be made that Berlin’s unique circumstances help to create the cultural atmosphere in which conscientious design is an integral part of life.

Returning to the intersection at Potsdamer Platz, one can see the amazing architecture that has risen since the falling of the wall with the help of international conglomerates like Sony and Daimler AG. Even before WWII

BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

01 Potsdamer Platz (1930s). Photo Credit: Corbis

destroyed it and the wall divided it, Potsdamer Platz had been an intersection that expressed the city’s strength as a capital of modernity, giving a home to Europe’s first stop light and an overall sense of hustle-and-bustle in a major metropolis. From the beginning, this place was connected to a German heritage that embraced the locale as a central point of exchange, as well as for its expression of modernity. The tug of war between the past and the future of the city’s identity includes the delicate balance between the painful history of the National Socialist government and the divided Germany and the desire to move forward and progress.

It is a delicate balance because there are certain things one would like to forget, but they are too important to just push to the wayside. Therefore, how Germany decides to rebuild and build-up places like Potsdamer Platz and the rest of its capital is a highly sensitive issue. In an essay entitled “Center and Periphery in the New Berlin: Architecture, Public Art, and the Search for Identity,” Brian Ladd continues to write about the role that rebuilding, memorials, and art are playing in the new Berlin, specifically placing an importance on art and its ability to help Berlin tackle its identity crisis. Ladd writes, “In their desperate wish to give meaningful form to their city, Berlin’s leaders often look to art to give coherence to their chaotic history... [There is] hope that this trust can open the way to more and effective c o n f r o n t a t i o n w i t h s p a c e a n d memory.” (“Center,” Ladd 15).

After spending time in this city and learning more and more of its history, it is difficult to not become more sensitive to the situation of the Berlin consciousness. Visiting the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe and the Reichstag provided such a strong impression of art’s role in repairing and rebuilding the city’s identity, but it was an unexpected find in the Berlinische Galerie that instilled a visceral response to the role art fills. At the gallery, an LED sign hangs above the exit scrolling the sentence: “DO YOU FEEL BETTER?” With so

02 Western view of Potsdamer Platz; Sony Center’s Mt. Fuji in the background. Photo Credit: S. Pham

many occurrences and situations to respond to, understand, and deal with, voicing and experiencing these aesthetic responses is the only way to move forward.

However, there are those that do not hold the same optimism for the progression of Berlin’s narrative. In The Ghosts of Berlin, Brian Ladd uses an interesting assertion from “Karl Scheffler’s 1910 book on Berlin, a phrase still quoted to characterize the city: ‘the tragedy of a fate…condemns Berlin forever to become and never to be’ (Ghosts, 123-124). Scheffler makes the assumption that this characteristic is tragic, but could it not be that this is what makes Berlin a new kind of city-a great city of design? It is only the beginning of the 21st century, and Berlin has still not escaped the consequences of the 20th century. People can speculate that with t ime the creative

BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

Sources:

Ladd, Brian. Ghosts of Berlin: Confronting German History in the Urban Landscape. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997.

Ladd, Brian. “Center and Periphery in the New Berlin: Architecture, Public Art, and the Search for Identity.” PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art, Vol. 22, No. 2, Berlin 2000 (May, 2000), pp. 7-21.

environment will fade away, as the hunger to forge an identity does the same. However, what if it is proposed that Berlin is a city that breaks the mold. Perhaps one should not feel sorrow for the city, thinking that it may never overcome its history; instead, maybe its history is what has allowed it to transcend above any understanding of what a collective identity can be.

It is not enough to simply call Berlin a “city of design,” and this is why it has received such distinction in the field from UNESCO. The distinction does not merely come from the large section of the population participating in the creative industries or the amount of revenues that they brings in. Instead, the design is necessarily associated to the culture of the city. The expression of these creative outlets has allowed the population of Berlin to voice their opinions, resolve the tug of war between their past and their future, and all the while providing a manner in which they can voice their excellence on the world stage.

BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

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02 Rosi’s in Friedrichschain Walking from the Warschauer Str. U+S Bahn and making the turn onto Revalerstrasse was an amazing sight to take in; the area is abuzz with people throughout the night and well into the daytime. With an imbiss shack on the corner feeding the crowds around the clock and a various range of nighttime hangouts, the area is alive with an exuberance I haven’t seen matched elsewhere. Along Revalerstrasse are various artists communes referred to as “squa[r]ts,”

bohemian n ight l i fe compounds inc lud ing Cassiopeia, “Crazy Beach,” and- at the far end of the street- Rosi’s. When asking for directions to Rosi’s, locals would say, “It’s a 10 minute walk, but well worth it!” And, they were right. At Rosi’s you can join in the dance party, hang out with friends, and nosh on snacks from their grill. The venue also holds special events, including music festivals, which allows for its authentic display of the local creative culture.

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Certain places in Berlin truly stood-out to me in their ability to offer up the environment that exemplifies the city’s way of life and makes the design culture possible. Here are a few of those places:

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0 1 M a u e r p a r k i n Prenzlauerberg After w a l k i n g u p K a s t a n i a n a l l e e a n d experiencing the relaxed sidewalk cafe culture, Mauerpark presents an incredible destination that typifies the laid-back Ber l in cu l ture wh i le offering a market filled with relics of the past and present. Grab a b ra twurs t o r done r kebab and spend some time on the grass or in one of the lawn-chair a n d s o f a - fi l l e d biergartens.

BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

03 Cafe Luzia on Oranienstrasse Living just up the street, this stretch of Oranienstrasse, lined with cafes, became dear to my heart. The leisurely brunch of muesli with yogurt & fruit and a cappuccino and the fun nightlife could be found all

along this street, but it was Cafe Luzia that truly excelled in both, adding to this was the locale’s artistic and intimate nature. With quaint furniture, cute figures painted onto the wallpaper adorned walls, local neighborhood charm on the weekdays, and live performances filling the spaces on the weekends , Ca fe Luz ia i s an i nc red ib le neighborhood refuge.

04 Potsdamer Platz Places of intersection have always interested me, and that is especially true of this locale. Today it is representative of the German capital’s burgeoning economic strength as well as

its history. It is a truly interesting place given the various phases it has been through and the amazing architecture that has emerged since 1 9 8 9 , b u t a n o t h e r aspect I appreciate is the art and history that the space is showcasing and preserving: Nam J u n P a i k , Rauschenberg’s bikes, a n d t h e H o t e l Esplanade.

05 Peter Eisenman’s Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe The dynamic between memory and moving forward in Berlin’s narrative presents a

captivating balancing act. The memorial is just one of the many elements of the city that express this balancing act; it takes up five acres of the Berlin landscape to memorialize the Jewish victims of National Socialism with a monument that transcends traditional memorials with its absence of symbolism. It is just one of the instances in which the city has expressed the power of art and how it can be used to create a healthy dialogue that can take the city into a new era.

06 Reichstag Despite my utmost appreciation for the power of art and design, before I entered this building I never thought a building could evoke such strong principles and ideals in the manner that the Reichstag does. With the physical design and the artwork that has been placed throughout the building, the German parliament building represents an appearance of transparency and shows that t h e m i s t a k e s o f p a s t governments will not happen again. While reading Zitty magazine’s 2008/2009 issue “The Fashion Book: Berlin,” I read about the “it” designers and stores, as well as some interviews with influential individuals in the Berlin fashion scene; one of the interviewees, Tanja Mühlhans, holds the position of “Advisor for C re a t i v e I n d u s t r i e s i n B e r l i n ’s S e n a t e Administration” (Zitty 133). Reading about Mühlhans and her job title, as well as seeing how the German government is both funding and turning to the arts as it moves forward and shapes its identity expresses the government’s dedication to the arts.

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BERLIN CITY OF DESIGN

07 Hamburger Bahnhof As the only location in this list that can be considered a traditional art-space, the finely curated modern art museum embodies this concept of incorporating a heritage into an artistic perspective of the future. In what was once a functioning railway station, people can now experience the work and philosophy of a great selection of modern artists. As a converted art-space, the building contains various wings and branches which are easy to miss, but the lay out adds to the museum’s refreshing approach of unconventional curatorial practices. The collection of photographs by Wolfgang Tillmans and the unusual use of size and space provides a perfect example of the museum’s push to revitalize the art world.

The museum was a moving experience, and a quote from artist Anselm Kiefer elicited an emotive response from me that made me feel truly connected to the progression of the city’s narrative. "’Rubble is the future. Because everything that is, passes. There is a wonderful chapter in Isaiah that says: grass will grow over your cities. This sentence has always fascinated me, even as a child. This poetry the fact that you see both things at the same time. Isaiah sees the city and the different layers over it. The grass, and then another city, the grass and then another city again.’ Anselm Kiefer, 2005”