Back in 2009, I posted a short news summary about plans to create a plaza to remember the falling of the Berlin Wall at the border crossing at Bornholmer Strasse. Recently, I was wondering if the plaza was completed and contacted sinai, the firm who were commissioned to develop the design and found out that indeed the plaza to commemorate such a historic moment in time had been completed.
From the designer
The border checkpoint at Bornholmer Straße is known as the place where the Berliner Wall fell. Here next to the Bösebrücke a space of remembrance for November 9 was formed – a space for remembering a single day.
The design conceives “the moment” as a memorable motif. The place is shaped by the powerful events of the day. Strips of steel are embedded in the ground to structure the elongated space into timespans. Pervading the space chronographically from east to west, they display quotes (such as Schabowsky’s “effective immediately without delay“) and descriptions of this historic day.
A loose arrangement of autumn-flowering cherry trees planted on the site grows gradually denser to form a grove-like cluster echoing the growing crowds of East Berliners who gathered at this spot. The cluster dismantles abruptly at the narrowest point of the corridor. 21.20- this is the moment where the first GDR citizen was able to cross the bridge without identity papers. The space around the “bridge bastion’ is the central place for displaying historical information via film carriers.
Completion | 2011
Client Land Berlin, Senatsverwaltung f. Stadtentwicklung,
Abteilung Stadt- und Freiraumplanung, IC3 Berlin
Verfahren
Planning 2009-2010
construction 2010
Area 1.350 m²
Project partners Fachliche Begleitung: Stiftung Berliner Mauer
Bildergalerie Konzept/Realisierung: Berliner Forum für Geschichte und Gegenwart e.V.
Gestaltung: gewerk GmbH 6 Co.Kg, Berlin
Objektdesign: Christian Fuchs, ON architektur, Berlin
