Twin Projects for Bielefeld. Frankfurt, Germany
Johannisberg Park Info Point and Sparrenburg Visitor Centre
Johannisberg park info point
The city of Bielefeld is bisected by forested hills, the Teutoburg Forest. The trading town was founded 800 years ago next to a hill pass over this ridge, which was subsequently guarded by the historical Sparrenburg fortress for a long time. In the 19th century, the 200 metre high Johannisberg hill vis-à-vis the hill pass was transformed into a park as a destination for pleasure trips. The project planned by Max Dudler – consisting of a visitor centre for the Sparrenburg fortress and an info point for the Johannisberg park – uses the two distinct twin buildings to form a relationship between the cultural monument and the landscape monument.
The design of the Johannisberg info point is similar to the intervention at the Sparrenburg gatehouse in terms of shape, dimensions and material. While the Sparrenburg visitor centre and the gatehouse fragment form a new gateway together, the info point appears like a spatial echo of this setting, subtly conveying the gatehouse function of the building at the north entrance of the park. Visitors to the single-storey pavilion nd information about the park’s offers here. WC facilities and seating are also provided.
To emphasise the impression of an ensemble, both buildings were constructed out of compressed concrete. The materiality of the individual and visible layers of compressed concrete results in a form of architecture that, precisely through its lack of perfection, forms an appealing addition to the park. What makes the material so exceptional is that its texture and colour create fascinating relation- ships both with the historic building layers of the Sparrenburg fortress as well as with the colours of the surrounding nature.
The cautious reinstatement work by landscape architects L-A-E on the Johannisberg park was honoured with the North Rhine-West- Phalian Landscape Architecture Prize 2014. Due to its central location, the Johannisberg hill lends itself ideally as a starting point for many day trips in the area. The park itself contains many historic details such as a fountainhead with a brook bed and footbridge, an old ticket booth, a grotto beneath a stage, and many staircases as well as natural stone and supporting walls. The Johannisberg hill is also an important memorial site for the fallen and wounded from World War I and the forced labourers placed in camps here during the Nazi era.
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Sparrenburg Visitor Centre
Only a few distinctive elements of the Sparrenburg fortress are left. A 37-metre tower, the main building, an outbuilding and the remains of a gatehouse de ne the current bailey, which was once the fortress’s outer bailey. The bailey is a very popular spot thanks to the views it offers of the city below.
The new single-storey building was designed as a self-contained module at the bailey’s south-eastern end. Together with the gatehouse torso, its structure forms a new gateway in which the historic entrance to the fortress can be re-experienced. At the same time, the structure has provided a new spatial frame for the bailey. Just like a compass, the intervention has clari ed the sequence and alignments of the fortress’s external areas and improved the functional preconditions for its current use as a monument and viewing point.
“The design is not a reconstruction of a certain historical state but instead adds a contemporary layer to the place’s ever-changing history” says Max Dudler. It is independent of the fortress’s various construction periods and styles in the sense that it doesn’t favour the medieval castle, the subsequent fortress, the 19th century reconstruction or the destructions of World War II over the others. Instead the design translates the existing buildings’ expression into a language current today.
Motifs found on site, such as the recesses in the fortress walls, are echoed and reinterpreted in the new building. The compressed concrete from which the visitor centre’s structure was layered most notably communicates a tangible sense of this design stance.
Like the sediment layers of stones, the colours and textures of the castle ruins have left their mark in its walls: both the limestone of the walls and the sandstone of the jambs. The lively structure of dry concrete and compressed layers also makes visible the craftsmanship that went into its construction.
The new building doesn’t touch the gatehouse fragment anywhere but leaves a gap between old and new. This opens the gateway for two paths to the right and left. One leads to the main building’s terrace, the other to the staff entrance in the rear. The straight main path also passes the visitor centre’s main entrance. The newly created ensemble of old and new buildings thus forms a place of arrival, distribution and information. Inside the visitor centre are a museum shop and the ticket area in a room using the same materials as the facade, as well as a kiosk facing the bailey to the north-east.
