Oscar Niemeyer, Félix Candela, Álvaro Siza: These are just some names folks typically affiliate with sculptural, hyperbolic strengthened concrete structure. However what about Ulrich Müther?
Müther practiced civil engineering in East Germany after World Warfare II, behind the Iron Curtain. By the Eighties, he had constructed 74 concrete “hypershells” throughout Germany, together with on his dwelling island of Rugen within the Baltic Sea; and in Finland, Libya, Jordan, Tripoli, and Kuwait. Müther, who died in 2007, is remembered as “the Oscar Niemeyer of the German Democratic Republic.”
At the moment, lower than 50 of Müther’s shells are nonetheless in existence (many had been abolished after Germany’s unification in 1990, like Berlin’s iconic Ahornblatt). However one among his signature initiatives—Hyparschale in Magdeburg, Germany—was just lately restored by architects von Gerkan, Marg and Companions (gmp), the German workplace who simply refurbished Actual Madrid’s soccer stadium in Spain.
Reviving Hyparschale Magdeburg
Magdeburg is a 2-hour drive west of Berlin, and Hyparschale Magdeburg is Müther’s largest remaining hyperbolic concrete construction. The strengthened concrete shell accomplished in 1969 sits throughout from Stadthalle Magdeburg, a Brick Expressionist theater by Johannes Göderitz and Wilhelm Deffke from 1928. Each sit on a financial institution above the Elbe River.
Development started on Hyparschale Magdeburg within the Nineteen Sixties beneath Gerling & Rausch, an area contractor, utilizing the Torkret course of. Underneath the Torkret course of, building employees constructed formwork fabricated from rebar and wooden shuttering, within the form the architect supposed.
Gerling & Rausch, beneath Müther’s path, used spray pumps to unfold a 7-centimeter layer of concrete atop the formwork. Remarkably, Gerling & Rausch managed to spray one contiguous space with none interruption to the 4 hyperbolic paraboloids that make up the constructing’s intricate roof.
For years, Hyparschale Magdeburg was used as a multifunctional occasion and exhibition venue. However the constructing was shuttered in 1997, and plenty of frightened it might be torn down. Fortunately, the construction was listed as a historic landmark in 1998.
Years of abandonment nevertheless left Hyparschale Magdeburg in a sorry state. gmp received the fee to revive the constructing in 2019, which culminated in its reopening this June. Hyparschale Magdeburg can now host occasions and exhibitions for as much as 500 folks.
The load-bearing capability of the roof has been restored and elevated with the assistance of carbon concrete, the design workforce shared. gmp additionally restored the massive openings that run between the shells, in any other case often called rooflights. (These options had been bricked shortly after the constructing opened in 1969.)
To make the venue match for contemporary wants, gmp designed new constructions inside the corridor. These cube-shaped rooms host galleries and are linked by pedestrian bridges. They had been designed to keep up a big, central open area beneath the sinuously curved roof.
The constructing’s sweeping, double-curved concrete roof covers an space of 150 toes by 150 toes with out inside columns. The roof floor is split into 4 equal elements, every with their very own double-curved geometry. In between the roof segments, ribbon skylights abound that illuminate the middle of the corridor with a star formed aperture.
The Rise of Glasarkitektur
Glass structure was popularized in Germany within the early twentieth century. It began when, in 1914, the visionary German author Paul Scheerbart revealed Glasarkitektur which described a utopian, future world the place buildings had been fabricated from glass as a substitute of heavy masonry. These glass constructions and the egalitarian society who constructed it, Scheerbart believed, would convey “paradise on earth.”
Historian Chris Rehorst famous that Scheerbart was mates with Bruno Taut. That very same yr, in 1914, Taut devoted his canonical Glass Pavilion on the Werkbund Exhibition in Cologne, Germany, to Scheerbart. Taut’s legendary e book, Alpine Structure, was revealed shortly after in 1919.
Alpine Structure had super affect on architects like Walter Gropius, Mies van der Rohe, and Peter Behrens. Taut’s attain is properly understood, however his mental relationship with Scheerbart wasn’t acknowledged till 1959 in a textual content by Rayner Banham that gave the German futurist his full due.
Ulrich Müther was born in 1934, 20 years after Scheerbart’s treatise was revealed, however was nonetheless influenced by him, Taut, and their disciples.
Preserving Ulrich Müther’s Legacy
Müther spent his childhood in Binz, Germany, an island within the Baltic Sea. His household owned a building firm which, in 1953, was nationalized by the newly created German Democratic Republic (GDR). In 1958, Müther took over his household’s building enterprise, albeit one which was now owned by the GDR. He proceeded to construct his signature concrete shells all through central Europe, Scandinavia, and the Center East.
It wasn’t till 1990, beneath German reunification, that Müther’s household enterprise was repatriated. That yr, it switched from the defunct GDR again into non-public fingers. However unification wasn’t variety to Müther, or his legacy. He declared chapter in 1993. And a number of other of his concrete constructions just like the Lifeguard Rescue Tower (1975) in Binz, and Ahornblatt in Berlin (1973) have been demolished.
Due to the efforts of gmp, Müther’s largest remaining hypershell will dwell on for future generations. Stephan Schütz, govt associate at gmp, led the design workforce. “A primary prerequisite of any profitable conversion is an appreciation for what others created prior to now,” Schütz stated in a press release.
“Together with Ulrich Müther’s grand gesture of the sweeping roof,” Schütz continued, “we reopened the ribbon-shaped rooflights so, as initially supposed, they as soon as once more heighten the 4 shell wing shapes and drench the interiors with copious daylighting.”
