Project site: FAHRBEREITSCHAFT Berlin-Lichtenberg
Client: Axel & Barbara Haubrok
Commission: Two courtyards within a commercial mixed use site
Eleven shipping containers for storage & courtyard and social green space on former gas station site – realized 2018 –
Axel and Barbara Haubrok are collectors of Minimal art and are recognized as a recent substantial contribution to the contemporary Berlin Art Scene. Their collection includes objects at a variety of scales from delicate objects to jet-planes.
In 2012 they purchased the former East-German Government vehicle staging ground. FAHRBEREITSCHAFT in Berlin-Lichtenberg.
The two-hectare commercial site with garages and facilities is carefully developed as a unique hybrid of existing and new workshops. Some of the auto related paint-shop and tire shops remain other tenants including frame builder and wooden boat hull manufacturer add to the mix.
With the background of minimalist art and a sensibility to historic preservation the Haubroks cautiously develop the facilities incrementally. As a consultant in this framework we developed a concept for the open spaces.
The concept underlines the principle of threading lightly with few and deliberate interventions that contribute and enhance the character of the site context.
The commission asked for additional storage space offering an opportunity for restructuring the courtyards in necessary access in the front and a hortus conclusus in the back designated for substituting the pavement into a birch grove. Eleven shipping containers were placed into the southern courtyard and provide a deliberate juxtaposition in material and color to the translucent polycarbonate façade of the adjacent workshop building by Brandlhuber.
Another requirement is to compensate the impact of the atelier building. In the adjacent former Gas station site a set of six underground manholes for maintenance of defunct underground petrol tanks are remediated and the volume of the manholes turned into planters for river birches. This provides a social open space for the employers and visitors of the site to meet.
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