Nine bureaus participated in the closed competition, which was held in two stages: we are publishing the works of seven of them that are currently available. Besides Gery, these are the second and third places in Berlin workshops Kleihues + Kleihues and Barkow leibinger, finalist Christoph Ingenhoveneliminated by the results of the first round David Chipperfild, Hans Kollhoff, Berlin branch of an Austrian company Baumschlager Eberle (now operating under the name BE Berlin). Also did not qualify for the final David Adjaye and Architectonica, have not yet shown their projects to the public.
Alexanderplatz, the famous Berlin square located in the GDR zone, was planned to be rebuilt after the unification of Germany: according to Hans Kollhoff's plan, ten 150-meter skyscrapers were to be erected there. But the owners of the department stores that existed there preferred their reconstruction to demolition, and only now, 20 years later, a single tower will appear there. The Gehry building will be visible from different parts of the city, and its residents will be able to look down at the entire center of the German capital.
The developer was the American company Hines, which
successfully collaborated with Frank Gehry in New York. The budget of the Berlin skyscraper will be 250 million euros, and its construction is scheduled for 2015-2017. The 39 floors will house 300 apartments, restaurants, a hotel and a spa. The facade of the tower will not be sheathed with metal, like many other buildings of the Californian architect: it is assumed that it will be covered with some kind of "mineral" material. This decision, along with the overall "harmonious" interpretation of the exterior, was especially appreciated by the jury chaired by Peter Schweger, co-author of the Federation Tower project in Moscow City.
