Jesse Simon visits some of Berlin’s notable Brutalist (and Brutal-adjacent) buildings…
In the 1980s-90s, few things were more reviled than raw, unfinished concrete. Architects who had no qualms about designing cartoonish pastel pink buildings with oddly placed windows and ironic references to classical antiquity looked back on the previous three decades where concrete had reigned supreme, and shook their heads in disbelief.
But as we move into the third decade of the twenty-first century, and the tangle of social and political arguments that shaped twentieth-century architecture recedes further into the distance, it has become easier to judge past architectural movements on formal merits alone—and Brutalism in particular has experienced a surprising reappraisal in the last decade.
Although it was arguably one of the most polarising movements of its time, a new generation has come to appreciate its social aspirations, visual invention and bold aesthetic. Between high-profile art books and a series of maps devoted to concrete treasures in various cities, Brutalism’s stock has never been higher…and perhaps inevitably, the term has come to be used as a catch-all for buildings from a particular era (the 1950s to the 1970s) that employ imposing, rational forms and make an aesthetic virtue of the raw materials used in construction—usually reinforced concrete.
The movement, known initially as the ‘New Brutalism’, has its roots in Scandinavia, but emerged most prominently in the U.K. during the 1950s, where the need for large-scale residential resettlement in post-war cities collided fortuitously with new lower-cost building techniques. At their best, the earliest examples of Brutalism offered new alternatives to the unwieldy urbanism that had developed in the wake of the industrial revolution.
Of course the underlying social principles of Brutalism were not always adopted by subsequent architects, but the aesthetic of raw materials—simultaneously bold and inexpensive—became a popular style unto itself and spread quickly throughout the world, finding its greatest application in public housing, hospitals, educational buildings and places of worship.
The use of concrete was widespread in Berlin in post-war construction projects, as it was in every city—yet there are remarkably few buildings today that embrace the Brutalist aesthetic, and even fewer that could be described as masterpieces of the genre. Perhaps a city whose very existence was defined by the 23-mile strip of raw reinforced concrete that divided it in two was wary of adding more to the urban space.
Yet the influence of Brutalism is apparent throughout Berlin if one is willing to look. The selection of buildings discussed below is far from exhaustive, but should provide a reasonable starting point for anyone wishing to search for concrete gems on their travels through the city.
Residential Buildings
Le Corbusier wasn’t the first architect to make a case for the aesthetic value of unconcealed beton brut—as unfinished concrete is known in France—but he was arguably the most influential. When concrete is poured into a form made from slats of wood, it results in a rough surface, imprinted with wood-grain and lined by seams where the boards met.
While it was customary to hide the concrete behind some sort of cladding, or sand it down to a refined smoothness, Le Corbusier embraced the imperfection in his first Unité d’Habitation, built in Marseille in 1953. The Unité was no mere residential block. With a nursery, an internal shopping area, and a communal roof terrace with commanding views of the Mediterranean, it was a self-contained social unit and the most complete expression to date of Le Corbusier’s desire to forge a new mode of living that turned away from the unruly sprawl of post-industrial urbanism.
Concrete may have been the most practical material for the project, but with its complex articulation of balconies and vibrant primary colour scheme, the Unité avoids the oppressive monotony of so many of the slabs that followed in its wake. Both the building materials and the underlying ideology would have a defining influence on the emerging Brutalist movement in England.
In Berlin, the organisers of the 1957 International Architectural Exhibition (known as Interbau 1957) had assembled many of the world’s leading architects to rebuild the Hansaviertel area north of Tiergarten, offering different approaches to the problem of modern residential housing. When they asked Le Corbusier for a contribution, he proposed another iteration of the Unité.
It soon became apparent that the design was far too large to fit within the limited space of Hansaviertel, and a new site was found just south of the Olympia Stadion on the far western edge of town. Le Corbusier and the planning authorities of Berlin were at odds from the outset. Not only did the city increase the ceiling height—throwing off the architect’s painstakingly conceived system of measurement based on the golden section—but they also dispensed with the integrated amenities which had made the original Unité so groundbreaking.
Where the Marseille version had been a visionary design for modern living, the Berlin version was essentially just a block of flats. The final building may have fallen short of Le Corbusier’s ideals, but it remains arguably the most elegant of Berlin’s Plattenbauten. Its successes can be appreciated all the more clearly by comparing it with the Pallasseum in Schöneberg—constructed…