the former telefunken headquarter is a historical monument of berlin, it reminds us about human ways of life and work in the past century. the complex of buildings is a work of the famous and cosmopolitan architect hans hertlein, the designer, creator and inspirator of the famous berlin siemensstadt.
the ensemble of buildings is a sign of industrialisation and urban development in berlin at the beginning of 1900: sign for progress, technology, economic revival, inventions and developments. it is an traditional heritage of the city berlin. telefunken built its headquarter for eternity, what is still demonstrating the outstanding state of the art.
the ensemble is unimpressed of his heterogenous neighborhood in the berlin jungle of suburbia. it is a city of its own, a city which is worth to be conserved and worth to be acquired in a new way. a city, which emanates, while entering a huge silence, independence and self-approval. the found building structure presents a timeless basic order which is offering especially exhaustless varieties to use. the basic order is signed by unity, liberality and clearness: huge expansions of construction, large halls and an impressive richness of light. the scale of proportion in this uninhabited situation fertilizes and expands traditional ideas of living. the historical determination moves the fantasy and creates a new identity from iside out. the obvious jump of dimension is leading us to the definition: loft. in this halls, pictographicaly named loftland, just furniture have to be installed, to make it habitable. to follow this idea of design we leave spacious areas and look upon furnishing and built in components as temporary accessoires. the design leads to a contemporary living and working space within the interaction between the tools for living. when a vast space is of a more complex design, their metamorphose leads to a studio, an atelier or a kind of loft.
loftland just suggest spaces instead of define them. the huge deepness of the building makes it possible to place rooms with a serving function in a way to reach excellent expose and fluent arrangements. the intention is to record memories and experiences of the residents by melting them into a custom made floor plan. necessary private rooms are located in niches and are interlocked with the central loft. the lofts are offering the opportunity to change the function of the spaces for every day life.
relationships between rooms can be connected or devided. walls can be static or as an option, being built sliding, folding or paravent elements. it is possible to combine particular loft parcels in their horizontal as well as in their vertical levels. plumbing units are separeted into cubes and offer the opportunity, to separate an own room by sliding or turning a wall element, or they can be combined with bedroom and have natural light. these changes between mixing and deviding functions allow us temporary interpretations of varying qualities, which includes modern, practical as well as representative space in living and working. in certain sense the former telefunken headquarter offers endless tempting possibilities of design. a “building site for forward looking and open minded ways of life” in both the individual and or the collective spirit of our time. culture will be preserved and developed, hundred years ago the energy put into telefunken will now support another life.
