Military History Museum, Dresden

Daniel Libe­skind himself sug­gests the Mil­i­tary History Museum in Dresden is the “purest Libe­skind struc­ture” to date. That it should have been a cause of great con­tention ever since it opened in 2011 comes as no sur­prise what­so­ever. An avant-garde wedge-type build­ing in steel, con­crete and glass now punc­tures the pomp of the pre­vi­ously uni­formly neo-Clas­si­cist arsenal built in 1877, an age in which there were fewer moral qualms where issues of war were con­cerned. The debates that Libe­skind trig­gered with his project in Dresden, a city of a some­what con­ser­v­a­tive per­sua­sion in such matters, will neither have sur­prised nor both­ered him greatly.

An in­sti­tu­tion such as this that tells of the horrors of war and seeks to arouse feel­ings of com­pas­sion amongst its patrons simply cannot afford to in­gra­ti­ate itself. The build­ing sched­ule first foresaw re­turn­ing the three-winged, cream-coloured sand­stone build­ing to its orig­i­nal state. Roughly a fifth of its struc­tural sub­stance was then removed to ac­com­mo­date a new build­ing 97.5 feet high at the front and 65 feet high at the back. Part of the ground-floor vault­ing in the listed struc­ture was like­wise sac­ri­ficed. Finally, the “wedge tip”, which is shaped to re­sem­ble a bomb crater, was re­placed by a glazed steel skele­ton 140 tonnes in weight. The actual wedge, by con­trast, was made in con­crete and weighs far more.

Such provoca­tive dis­so­nance is con­tin­ued inside and un­der­pins the scheme’s in­no­v­a­tively open style. The museum tour again and again entails the public ne­go­ti­at­ing the new part of the build­ing, in which the af­fir­ma­tive display of mil­i­tary equip­ment makes way for a study of its uglier con­se­quences. The doors and windows in Dresden’s Mil­i­tary History Museum are op­er­ated using FSB handles from the 1070 series. The handle’s sym­met­ri­cal cir­cu­lar styling with match­ing round roses avoids all brash­ness and yet never looks in­signif­i­cant, making it par­tic­u­larly suit­able for public build­ings.

Photos: Jan Bitter