Léon Wohlhage Wernik Architekten, Berlin
The second largest country in the world and the smallest federal state in Germany have recently been represented in Berlin: politically, socially, culturally - and architecturally. Léon Wohlhage Wernik is the architect of the two new buildings, the Embassy of the Republic of India and the Representation of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen in Berlin.
The exhibition documents the completed buildings, but also provides a glimpse into the planning process by means of many working materials.
Embassy of the Republic of India
The Indian Embassy is also a solitary building in the neighbourhood. Facing the street, the building has a clear facade, which is cut by the cylindrical atrium of the public entrance and allows a view into the depths. The house, which appears as a cuboid on the outside, contains a complex arrangement of rooms on the inside, with a green garden courtyard at its heart. The correspondence between the building and the garden - both with square floor plans - is particularly evident in the play of mass and emptiness between the entrance atrium and the built cylinder. The cubic forms are expressed by red Indian sandstone, which was built up as raw broken stone. Open garden stairs lead from the garden via terraces to the roof terrace, which offers guests of the embassy a view over Berlin. Public access to the embassy is via the entrance atrium of the street façade. All areas open to the public are accessible from here, including the separately accessible consulate, the events hall, which lives from its orientation towards the garden courtyard, an exhibition hall with an adjacent library and a business centre.
State Representation of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen in Berlin
The State Representation of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen is also located in the diplomatic quarter on the southern edge of the Tiergarten. The architectural concept for the new building of the State Representation, an ensemble of two buildings with different cubature and height, was developed from the area of conflict between an open but dense villa structure and closed block-edge development. The guest house is the end point of the closed development along the Landwehrkanal and the prelude to the free-standing state representation as well as the subsequent series of further embassy buildings. Both buildings, sharp-edged, powerfully painted plaster buildings, are determined by the composition of their window openings, the deep incisions of the loggias and the entrance and the atrium in the roof. In the case of the guesthouse also by the sculptural small balconies. The ground floor and first floor form a flowing spatial continuum from the elevated entrance plateau to the street and into the garden at the back. The path leads from the entrance via the Bremenclub to the two-storey foyer as an anteroom to the large hall, which opens onto the terrace and the garden below. The front office on the first floor opens with a gallery to the foyer. The eight-storey guest house accommodates flats as well as small guest rooms. The top floor offers space for the guests of the state representation with a view over Berlin.
Speaking at the opening:
Kristin Feireiss Berlin/Rotterdam
Deputy Chief of Mission A.K. Pandey Indian Embassy, Berlin
Staatsrat
Erik Bettermann der Bevollmächtigte der Freien Hansestadt.
