New National Gallery Berlin

David Chipperfield Architects

Products

1015
Door handle fitting

We suspect that the un­der­ly­ing shape of the FSB 1015 orig­i­nated in the 1930s, con­ceived by a company called Wehag. This version by Jo­hannes Potente is a very clean-lined affair that is par­tic­u­larly sought after in the Nether­lands.

1015
Door handle fitting
10 1015
Single door handle

The invisible architect

Surely all ar­chi­tect love being able to fully for­mu­late and live out their ideas and visions in their ar­chi­tec­tural blue­prints. Over­haul­ing period struc­tures usually leaves little lat­i­tude for making their own dis­tinc­tive hall­marks visible, however. And yet the mere act of bring­ing a build­ing up to date in terms of energy ef­fi­ciency, barrier freedom and fire safety may, despite the changes made being points of fine detail, give it a com­pletely new look. The ten­dency for Vic­to­rian houses to be fitted with new, en­ergy-ef­fi­cient windows comes readily to mind here, for in­stance: the wider frames of the new windows are more than likely to throw the orig­i­nal, as­tutely con­ceived sense of geom­e­try out of kilter.

The main chal­lenges in­volved in over­haul­ing Berlin’s New Na­tional Gallery, built between 1961-1968, were pre­cisely the im­por­tance of each and every detail and the ar­chi­tect’s as­pi­ra­tion to leave as few visible traces as pos­si­ble. The museum build­ing by Mies van der Rohe is deemed an icon of Mod­ernist ar­chi­tec­ture, and its revamp was taken on by no lesser than the ar­chi­tect David Chip­per­field, who, along with his team, has already caught the eye with pro­jects such as his re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion of the New Museum in Berlin.

In the present in­stance, the ar­chi­tects were con­stantly called upon to square his­to­ri­ans’ ex­pec­ta­tions with those of the tech­ni­cal plan­ners, in other words to salvage the orig­i­nal design to the great­est fea­si­ble extent whilst nev­er­the­less es­tab­lish­ing the con­di­tions under which the tech­ni­cal plan­ners could improve the build­ing’s per­for­mance levels by con­tem­po­rary means. Some 35,000 orig­i­nal com­po­nents – in­clud­ing stone slabs mea­sur­ing almost 27,000 square feet (2,500 sq. m) – were dis­man­tled, re­stored and put back in place. Con­versely, the build­ing now profits in energy and build­ing-en­gi­neer­ing terms from some 17,225 square feet (1,600 sq. m) of new glazing. The de­ci­sion to stick with single glazing and make use of lam­i­nated safety glass 2x12 mil­lime­tres thick was a major factor in re­tain­ing the façade’s breezy in­tri­cacy.

Architect und Object

Photo: © Ingrid von Kruse

David Chip­per­field ex­plains the policy pursued in this over­haul of leaving as few visible traces as pos­si­ble thus: “It was of great im­por­tance to the client that whoever got the job did not seek to eclipse Mies van der Rohe. There’s only room for one ar­chi­tect in the build­ing. Though that may sound modest, it isn’t – it’s obvious.”

Modern museums as public temples

The museum’s ar­chi­tec­ture echoes the phi­los­o­phy of “less is more” and opens itself right up to the city of Berlin. Mies van der Rohe planned a build­ing in two parts, with a tem­ple-like hall to which one ascends via a stair­case and a base­ment housing the actual ex­hi­bi­tion spaces. The sober spaces on the lower floor owe their at­mos­phere to the way they in­ter­act with an ad­join­ing garden that is com­pletely cut off from all cos­mopoli­tan hustle and bustle. The museum’s cen­tre­piece is a com­pletely un­sup­ported, wholly glazed hall almost 30 feet (9 metres) high that forms the visitor’s first point of contact with the build­ing.

David Chip­per­field stresses the key role played by ground-plans in Mies van der Rohe’s ar­chi­tec­ture. Whereas it is straight­for­wardly pos­si­ble to retro­fit modern ser­vices, toilets etc. in some build­ings due to their being ex­pe­ri­enced as a suc­ces­sion of spaces, the plans devised by Mies van der Rohe are little short of con­sti­tut­ing full-blown works of art. The New Na­tional Gallery has at least ac­quired a bar­rier-free ex­ter­nal ramp and an el­e­va­tor. Turning former storage areas into a cloak­room and museum shop was the most sig­nif­i­cant spatial al­ter­ation made. The tex­tured ex­posed-con­crete ceil­ings in the old store­rooms were re­tained as a means of sym­bol­i­cally de­mar­cat­ing these spaces from the ar­chi­tec­tural core without in any way ac­cord­ing them a sep­a­rate iden­tity.

David Chip­per­field Ar­chi­tects ad­dressed them­selves ex­haus­tively to the door fit­tings. Driven by the wish to pre­serve as many orig­i­nal fea­tures as pos­si­ble, in­clu­sive of any patina they might have gained in some cases, the orig­i­nal lever handles from the 1960s were re­fit­ted to a great many of the build­ing’s doors. FSB joined forces with the ar­chi­tects to develop a handle capable of re­plac­ing any fit­tings that reach the end of their useful lives in future. A custom so­lu­tion was found for emer­gency-exit doors in the form of FSB 1045 de­signed as an upright handle for in­ac­tive door leaves and in­cor­po­rat­ing a green arrow. Toilet doors were fitted with a spe­cially adapted version of the FSB 1015 model fea­tur­ing bespoke roses on both sides.

Details

Photos: © Simon Menges

Location

Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin

Pots­damer Straße 50,
10785 Berlin,
Deutsch­land

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