Shell Haus (Tiergarten)

The Shell-Haus is considered a classical modernist architectural masterwork built by the German architect and professor Emil Fahrenkamp and opened in 1932.

At the time the building was noted for its modernist design, for its striking wave-like façade, and for being one of the first steel-framed high-rise buildings in Berlin. In retrospect it is regarded as Fahrenkamp’s masterpiece and one of the most significant office block designs of the Weimar Republic. 

Shell-Haus’ simplistic graceful forms are stylistically reminiscent of the German modern realist movement New Objectivity, but Fahrenkamp also incorporated more traditional aspects to his design.  It is an example of organic architecture because of the visual language from which the design drew inspiration, reminiscent of the movement of water.

The most eye-catching feature of Shell-Haus is its main façade, which jumps forward in six gentle waves whilst at the same time increasing in height from six levels (five at the back) to ten. The building itself comprises four wings situated around a four-sided inner courtyard.

The buildings survived to the WWII but it underwent a great deal of additional restoration until the present day, but in the end this work was awarded with the monument preservation prize medal.

It is still used as office space and GASAG, Berlin’s gas company, has its headquarters here.

More infos: WIKI
Map: http://goo.gl/maps/Fblz3

All images are under CC Creative Commons (Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works), please refer to " darioj laganà | www.norte.it "

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Goodbye White Trash (moving to Treptow on 25th)

It looks like the "Goodbye" posts are frequent in Berlin during the last two years and in the last period different entities have faced the problem of closing or of moving to another place. It has append to C/O Berlin (here the POST), to the Kater Holzig (full reportage HERE) and just this weekend also the historical YAAM has moved to a new location.

What is going on? For everyone is Gentrification, although it's very important to say that nowaday we're putting under the umbrella of gentrification everything, and not always is so simple. For example Kater Holzig had a contract of use of the building, the contract expired and they moved back to the Bar25 are where they're creating something new. C/O Berlin has a long lawsuite and then they have a new space in Charlottenburg. YAAM has exchanged the old place for a new one (for how long?).

What is for sure is that this city is a never sleeping city, but this is related also to the history of the city, you can read of those problems also in the late 19th and 20th century books, which doesn't mean that is a good thing, but somehow it is not just a problem of these days. The difference is that in this period it looks that there are more and more problems and everything is happening so fast (the city is normalizing).

The point for the White Trash is really simple. The current rent is something like 17.000€ (without costs) for the big place and they have decided to move to another area, where they can start fresh with a less expensive place.

The White Trash is a combination of different styles, with very kitsch furnitures in a former chinese restaurant style and the basement was used for concert. At in the years it has become a reference for the music in Berlin with the concerts of Madonna, Mick Jagger or Marilyn Manson for example.

But they're not giving up, they're just moving to the Arena area in Treptow starting from the 25th of April.

These pictures has been made in the last days of the White Trash and show an empty space, very far from the everyday life of the place.

Thanks to Valerio Bassan and Il Mitte (www.ilmitte.com) for the opportuny of taking these pictures.

More infos: http://www.whitetrashfastfood.com
Map: http://goo.gl/maps/7CgJN (old location)
Map: http://goo.gl/maps/uUbXu (NEW location)

All images are under CC Creative Commons (Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works), please refer to " darioj laganà | www.norte.it "

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