PETER ZUMTHOR: KOLUMBA MUSEUM, COLOGNE

ESPAÑOL

"The notion that our work is an integral part of what we achieve takes us to the very limits our musings about the value of a work of art."

Peter Zumthor

The Kolumba Museum in Cologne, Germany, is a remarkable work of Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, a Pritzker Prize laureate. In a display of mastery and sensitivity, the architect manages to fuse the ruins of a destroyed  Catholic church, with modern, sober and minimalist architecture, and highly sensitive to the theme of the works it houses: religious art.

OVERVIEW

A church dedicated to St. Columba, located relatively close to the magnificent Cologne Cathedral, used to be the most important church of the diocese. Unfortunately, the building was completely devastated after the allied bombing that reduced the city into ruins during the Second World War, with the exception of an old Gothic image of the Virgin placed on a pillar, which survived intact.

Church of St. Columba before the bombing

The church after the Allied bombing. Note the curved corner of the Manufactum Warenhaus also recognizable in other aerial views.

This icon, called "the Madonna of the Ruins" was considered by many a symbol of hope during the painful and difficult years of the  post-war reconstruction.

Photo courtesy of Thomas / Archikey

In fact, an octagonal chapel, designed by Gottfried Böhm in 1950, was built to honour the image. A precious historical value was added to the symbolic importance of the place, when in 1973  Roman , Gothic and medieval  ruins were discovered under the old church.

For this reason, the Kolumba art society, which keeps a large collection of Christian art (ranging from a portrait of the Emperor Tiberius' daughter from the first century, to the present) commissioned in 1997 a contest in order to revalorate the church and also to provide a space for displaying their collection in an area of ​​1.600 m2.

THE PROPOSAL


Peter Zumthor won the competition with an ambitious and humble idea at the same time: the building completely surrounds the ruins of the church and in fact merges with them while using the upper level and a side wing to house the exhibit areas.

First, second and third floor

Externally, the building is characterized by its massiveness, a simple and severe composition of warm-colored volumes and thus integrates both to its urban context as well as the historic site where is located.

However, despite this massiveness, the building is surrounded by garden areas that allow the space to permeate within the urban fabric.

See location on Google Maps

The texture of thin gray brick, handmade by Tegl Petersen of Denmark, frams the remains of the old chapel achieving a remarkable integration between new and old.

Part of the success in this fusion lies in the simplicity of form, color and material that embed these Gothic-style fragments.

Detail of the door. Photo courtesy of d.teil

Detail of the back stairs.  Photo courtesy of Dorena .

Photo courtesy of teraform

Another noticeable feature are the perforations on the facade, forming a kind of lattice made on the basis of  the bricks themselves.  This effect lightens the perception of the volume.

It is however in the interior of the building where Zumthor's work can be better appreciated. The architect has wrapped both the octagonal chapel as well as the Roman ruins with a double height nave supported by thin metal columns. This monumental space is dramatically lit up since indirect light filters through the lattice in the walls. This effect reminds me of that used by Luis Barragan in the Chapel of the Capuchinas in Mexico.

Photo courtesy of  Jose Fernando Vasquez

The visitor is able to walk throughout the chapel by means of a winding passage which lies over the ruins. This is a resource is used in some archaeological sites in order to allow visitors to experience the sites from up close, but reducing the impact on heritage (as, for example in the Basilica Cistern in Istanbul, Turkey ).

Photo courtesy Jose Fernando Vasquez

Photo courtesy Jose Fernando Vasquez

Besides the chapel, the building includes 16 exhibition rooms arranged on three levels, including the area on top of the church. In these areas, works of ancient and contemporary religious art works are displayed, including some books of sacred art.

The exhibition area of these galleries is dotted with large windows from where the architect frames some superb views of the surrounding cityscape, also reflected in the polished white floor of these rooms.

The building also opens its views to some courts designed in a serene Zen minimalism, which houses works by famous sculptors like Richard Serra and Joseph Wolf.

 Photo courtesy of  Jose Fernando Vasquez

In sum, both by the use of form, material and light, the architect of manages to imbue the museum with a sense of serenity and meditation that, while it is perfectly suitable to house the collection of Catholic art, it transcends the boundaries of a specific religion to imbue the visitor with an atmosphere of spirituality away from the worldly bustle of the city.

""The architectural drawings trying to express the aura of the building in place as closely as possible. But the very effort of this representation often serves to underline the absence of the object itself, and what emerges is the type of deficiency culaquier representation, curiously about the reality that promises, and perhaps, if the promise has the power to move-a longing for his presence. "

Peter Zumthor

SEE ALSO
 - ART MUSEUMS

• Hoki Museum, Chiba, Japan. Tomohiko Yamanashi (2008-10)
• Miho Museum, Shiga, Japan. I. M. Pei (1997)
• Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, Japan. Le Corbusier (1959)
• National Art Center, Tokyo, Japan. Kisho Kurokawa (2000-06)
• Suntory Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan. Kengo Kuma (2004-07)
• Watari-Um Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. Mario Botta (1985-90)

Claudio Happy Birthday Claudio! It was a pleasure to visit the Kolumba together. 

LE CORBUSIER: UNITÉ D'HABITATION IN BERLIN

ESPAÑOL

The Unités d'habitation are among the most famous works of Le Corbusier. As part of a larger and more radical approach, these huge housing units have influenced the development of residential projects around the world in the decades after their construction.


Of the 5 units built, the one in Berlin has sui generis characteristics, since Le Corbusier had to adapt the design of the building to the German modulated regulatory requirements. This post will explore some of the most important features of the unité in Berlin, and will take a closer look to some details Berlin building and the surprising change in the composition of its inhabitants today.

LE CORBUSIER'S URBAN IDEAS

In 1922 Le Corbusier presented a radical urban plan: the Ville Contemporaine, which was a criticism of the European city at that time: overcrowded, unhealthy, bleak. Le Corbusier proposed to demolish everything and build large residential blocks surrounded by parks and arranged so that they do not shade each other.

Le Corbusier compared the gloomy and unhealthy character of many areas in European cities with its proposal to the contemporary city. The picture, taken at the Unité in Berlin contrasts two situations: Le Soleil et l'Ombre (sun and shade).

His ideas were never fully implemented, despite the famed Swiss architect spent his life planner offering their services in many parts of the world, from Buenos Aires to Berlin. Only succeeded in Chandigarh, India.

THE UNITÉ D'HABITATION

However, only 5 residential units were built around the world. The most famous of the units is that of Marseilles, in France, called the Cité Radieuse or Radiant City (1945). Others are located in Nantes-Rezé (1952), Berlin (1956), Briey-en-Forêt (1957) and Firminy (1960).

Garden Terrace Radieuse Cité, the Unité d'Habitation in Marseille.

The idea was to build these large units as independent small towns, each with many different housing types, from apartments for singles to family residences for up to 10 people. Also, public facilities were to be included that allow these units to operate autonomously ,such as shops, sports areas medical and educational facilities within the building. It must be said, however, that after some time, the Unités began to deteriorate and they just never worked as independent "small cities", as Le Corbusier had envisioned.

The Unité in Berlin

The volumes are essentially elongated boxes, supported on pilotis in order to achieve better spatial integration with its pedestrian environment. The terrace was used as a garden to compensate the occupied area to nature (the 5 principles above explained corbuserianos in its design Curutchet House in La Plata, Argentina).

Unité Briey-en-Forêt.

Inside the residential unit in Marseille.

A fundamental aspect of these houses was the economy, both in the materials used and in the modulation of the different elements of housing, for which Le Corbusier developed a system of proportions which he called Modulor.

The Modulor

In an attempt to find an independent measurement system to the inch and the meter, and that would be more reklated to the proportions of the human body, Le Corbusier developed the Modulor, based on the Fibonacci series and the golden section. For him, it meant a "set of harmonic measures appropriate to the human scale, universally applicable to mechanical things."


Many of the compositional elements of the buildings of Le Corbusier, in particular the housing units, were designed based on the proportions of the modulor, both in plan and section, from the general dimensions to the small details.

The exteriors of the Unité de Berlin are decorated with depictions of the Modulor.

OVERVIEW IN BERLIN

After the devastation of Berlin by the Allies at the end of World War II, hundreds of thousands of Berliners were left homeless. During the reconstruction the authorities prioritized the construction of affordable housing complexes.
In 1956 the Berlin Planning Committee received a proposal from Le Corbusier to build one of his unités. The committee wanted to capitalize on the fame of Swiss architect and found him a location for his building on the Charlottenburg hil , with superb views of the city (this is very unusual, as noted by Living Numbers magazine, as an architect is usually told a location for a project, not a project is set somewhere in the city after it is designed).

View of Berlin from the Unité.

The implementation of the Berlin unité took place between 1956-59, when the city was not yet divided by the wall.

LOCATION

The multifamily unit is very close to the monumental Olympic Stadium built by the architect Werner March for the Berlin Olympics in 1936 during the Third Reich.

See location on Google Maps
Views of Berlin's Olympic Stadium, built by the Nazis between 1934-36. Hitler favored a simple but monumental neoclassical architecture.

The unit is located on a small hill, in the middle of a vast park.


Unlike the pompous megalomaniac prelude to the stadium, the access to the unité is indirect, through a winding road that approaches from the northwest and allows a general visual perception of the block, a resource also used by Le Corbusier in his approach to other works, such as the church at Ronchamp, for example.


UNITÉ IN BERLIN

Le Corbusier's proposal for Berlin includes 530 apartments distributed in 17 levels. However, they are accessed only through 9 "streets" which are actually quite wide corridors, much wider than those of a common residential building, where residents would supposedly enjoy social interaction.

Section and typical plant of the building.

This is because the homes are duplex, that is to say, a two-story apartment, and have internal stairs, enjoying more spaciousness than many of the apartments today.

Some views of the original apartments, expressing comfort and modernity

Each house also has separate balconies, forming a grid than can be seen from the exterior. This allows light to enter, but protects the inside of excessive solar radiation.


Le Corbusier intended to express the individuality of each department through series of color tones applied in the large white canvas which is the building's facade.


The idea of using color to give some character to the repetitive facade has been used in subsequent residential buildings throughout the world, such as the recent Shinonome Canal Court in Tokyo Bay, by Toyo Ito, Riken Yamamoto and others .

One of the "internal streets", unusually wide for this type of building. However, they evoked me a hospital.

The finishing, as this light, is pretty simple.

Details of the inner circulations. Unlike the large windows within the apartments, these public spaces are more introverted and have small windows.

Unlike other unités, like Marseille, Berlin has little additional facilities. At the beginning a children's nursery, a post office, a small supermarket and a bank were added, but they do not work anymore.


L'UNITÉ YESTERDAY AND TODAY

The Unit was created as a economic multifamily housing complex. Here poor families settled, and there are some media compared the housing units with a honeycomb. Over time the building was sold to the private company Präzisa, and many of its original occupants 50 years ago have moved or have simply died.

"Happiness in a honeycomb cells" criticized the German newspapers.

Despite criticism, the Unité was massively occupied due to the shortage of housing.

However, despite what you might expect, we find the building in good condition and very well maintained by its residents. This is because in addition to some of their original occupants, most people are architects, artists and intellectuals who are proud to live in a very prestigious building by Le Corbusier.

The "open plan" designed by Le Corbusier as a spatial relationship with the environment is today a public parking lot.

Although the building has lost its original social role for which it was designed and has become a sort of elitist habitat, on the other hand this situation has allowed the unité (now called Corbusierhaus) to endure more than 50 years in very good condition.

SEE ALSO:

- Other works of Le Corbusier.

• Curutchet House. La Plata, Argentina (1949-53).
• Museum of Western Art. Tokyo, Japan. (1959)

- Multifamily Housing

• Nakagin Capsule Tower, Tokyo, Japan. Kisho Kurokawa (1970-72)
• Nexus World, Fukuoka, Japan. Isozaki, Koolhaas, Portzampark, Holl, etc. (1991)
• Shinonome Canal Court, Tokyo, Japan. Toyo Ito, Kengo Kuma and others (2004)

An excellent host, the architect Marco Ramos, who has visited several works of Le Corbusier, led me to the Unité in Berlin showing me many details that I have shared in this post.