Breitscheidplatz
Tel. 030- 218 5023
Bus: 100, 200, X- 9
Open: Mon- Sun
The Protestant Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church is a
monument on Breitscheidplatz in the Berlin district of
Charlottenburg. It was built by Franz Schwechten in the
neo-Romanesque style on behalf of Kaiser Wilhelm II in memory of his
grandfather Kaiser Wilhelm I in the years 1891-1895. At 113 meters,
its church tower was the highest in the city at the time.
The
Memorial Church was severely damaged in 1943 during the Second World
War. After a dispute about the reconstruction, an agreement was
reached on the demolition of the nave, the preservation of the tower
ruins as a memorial against the war and the construction of a new
four-part building ensemble. This was built in 1959-1963 by Egon
Eiermann in the modern style and consists of the nave, the church
tower, the chapel and the foyer.
The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial
Church is one of the best-known landmarks in western Berlin and one
of the most popular sights in the German capital. A memorial hall
has been located in the ruined tower since 1987.
Construction preparations
The original church
building of the community goes back to the program of the Evangelical
Church Building Association. At the suggestion of Kaiser Wilhelm II, the
importance of the building was expanded to include the facet of the
memorial in honor of Wilhelm I. In the architectural competition
announced for this purpose, Franz Schwechten, who later became the royal
building officer and member of the building academy, prevailed.
Schwechten had already made a name for himself in Berlin by building the
Anhalter Bahnhof based on his designs.
Although officially the
Church Building Association was the building contractor, the reigning
imperial couple often influenced the execution and visited the
construction site several times. However, the imperial family hardly
contributed to the financing. The construction costs of 6.8 million
marks were mainly raised by individuals and the individual German
states. A commemorative and commemorative publication was also
published, the net profit of which was intended to help cover costs, and
the purchase of which was also officially advertised. The cornerstone
was laid on March 22, 1891 to commemorate the birthday of the namesake.
The inauguration was celebrated on September 1, 1895, the evening before
Sedan Day.
Schwechten, a native of Cologne, had submitted a
design in the Neo-Romanesque style, based on the Romanesque churches of
the Rhineland. The number of towers and the shape of the crossing tower
are reminiscent of the Bonn Minster, the chancel of the Marienkirche in
Gelnhausen. Many details have been taken over very precisely. The
imitation went so far that tuff was used for the facade, which occurs in
the Eifel and was used for Rhenish churches, but was completely foreign
to Brandenburg.
The building with its five towers looked
impressively monumental. The main tower, which is largely preserved
today, was 113 meters (now: 71 meters) the tallest in the city of
Charlottenburg, which was independent until 1920. Following the example
of this church, Romanesque Revival became a popular architectural style
for a time throughout Germany. Several buildings in the immediate
vicinity were also built in the neo-Romanesque style with a conscious
reference to the church and formed the so-called "Romanesque Forum".
Directly adjacent examples of this, also designed by Schwechten, were
the "First Romanesque House" west of the church and the "Second
Romanesque House" east of the church on the site of today's Europa
Center.
Organ
In 1894/95 W. Sauer Orgelbau delivered his Opus
660, an organ with four manuals, 91 registers and pneumatic cone chests.
In 1920, Sauer added an echo mechanism. It remained with four manuals,
but the organ now had 103 registers. Sauer repaired it in 1938, and in
November 1943 it fell victim to a hail of bombs along with the church.
Bells
Because of the volume of the five-part ringing - which at
that time was only surpassed by that of Cologne Cathedral in size and
weight - and the crowd, the wolves of the Zoological Garden became
restless and howled:
“Long, echoing howls, the barking of the
mutts and the hoarse barking of the wolves mingled with the peace
salutation of the bells and accompanied the cheers of the audience. But
that wasn't on the agenda. A police officer on horseback rushed madly
toward the Zoological Gardens; a few constables rushed in to forbid the
howling beasts to sing by virtue of their office and authority—but the
rebellious beasts had little respect for the blue uniforms: they howled,
yapped and barked incessantly.”
– Fedor von Zobeltitz: Chronicle of
society under the last empire
The bells, made from bronze from
guns captured in the Franco-Prussian War, fell victim to material
shortages during World War II. Four of the five bells were removed from
the tower on January 7, 1943 and melted down again for war purposes.
Only the smallest bell remained for the congregation. When the church
was destroyed, this bell was badly damaged and in 1949 it was delivered
to the Schilling bell foundry in Apolda, where it was once cast.
interior design
The interior of the church was
elaborately designed. The walls and vault were decorated with a total of
2740 m² of glass mosaics, made by the Puhl & Wagner workshop.
Schaper Mosaics
In the vestibule of the old church, which is still
accessible today, there are mosaics of significant craftsmanship, which
were designed by Hermann Schaper and executed by Puhl & Wagner. For the
most part, they clarify the idea of divine right, which was already
considered outdated at the time.
The sculptor Adolf Brütt also
created a picture cycle for the vestibule, completed in 1906, which on
the one hand depicted the life of Wilhelm I and on the other hand
contrasted the events of the wars of liberation with the Franco-Prussian
War of 1870/1871.
destruction
During the night of November
22-23, 1943, the church building caught fire during a British air raid,
causing the roof structure over the nave to collapse and the top of the
main tower to snap off. The Nazi leadership gave the community a promise
to rebuild the destroyed Memorial Church just as large and magnificently
after the Second World War. In contrast, the victorious powers of the
Second World War found this plan relatively difficult; the building also
reflected Wilhelmine-German national pride. In the post-war period, the
ruins were left to decay for the time being. It was not until 1956 that
demolition of the choir, which was in danger of collapsing, began.
New Memorial Church: modern buildings
preservation and remodeling
In March 1957, Egon Eiermann won the architectural competition to
rebuild the church. His model envisaged the complete demolition of the
ruins in favor of a modern new building. These plans provoked an
unusually passionate public debate. It ended with a compromise that was
reluctantly accepted by both the architect and the citizens. The 71
meter high ruins of the old main tower remained structurally secure as a
memorial against the war, surrounded by a four-part building ensemble
based on Eiermann's designs. An octagonal nave and a rectangular foyer
to the west of the old truncated tower and a hexagonal bell tower (53.5
metres) and a chapel, also rectangular, to the east of it. The
foundation stone for the new building was laid on May 9, 1959, and on
December 17, 1961 the finished church was inaugurated by the regional
bishop Otto Dibelius. The entire ensemble of the Memorial Church is now
listed and is considered an important memorial of the post-war period
and one of the most striking buildings in Berlin. The building is often
visited by tourists. In the vernacular of Berlin, the octagonal nave and
the new bell tower are also known as "lipstick and powder box", and the
ruined tower was sometimes called "hollow tooth". Colloquially it is
called KWG for short.
Furnishing
Architect Egon Eiermann also
designed all the essential elements of the ensemble's interior – altar,
pulpit and baptismal font, candlesticks, lamps, pews, floor and even the
organ case. Eiermann originally intended a simple cross above the altar.
However, he was forestalled by the regional bishop Otto Dibelius, who
gave the church the resurrection Christ created by Karl Hemmeter in
Tombak, weighing almost 300 kilos and 4.60 meters tall. In a side chapel
on the right is a bronze plaque commemorating the evangelical martyrs of
1933-1945. A crucifix from Spain from the 13th century is attached to
it. The Stalingrad Madonna can also be seen in the chapel.
Blue
light
A characteristic of the new buildings are the gridded walls,
which consist of a total of more than 20,000 unitary glass windows. The
French glass artist Gabriel Loire, who designed glass walls and stained
glass windows for around 400 churches in France alone and numerous
others around the world, had prepared them in his workshop in Chartres.
Specially strong, colored glass was broken into irregular small pieces,
arranged into square shapes and set in concrete lattices. The incident
light is additionally refracted on the broken surfaces of the pieces of
glass, similar to the effect with cut gemstones. In Berlin, the Berlin
art glaziers Harry Schütt and Detlef Graw then hung the grid elements in
the steel construction of the facades. Loire's ultramarine blue was
inspired by the blue in the Jesse tree in Chartres Cathedral. It became
more intense than the light water blue that Eiermann originally
intended. The blue glass walls are only inserted from a height of four
meters so as not to dazzle the church visitors. The double-walled
construction of the central building, four centimeters thick, keeps the
noise of the nearby busy streets away.
tower clock
The clock
on the ruins of the main tower was brought up to the latest state of the
art in 1959 at a cost of 430,000 marks (adjusted for purchasing power in
today's currency: around 1.14 million euros). The illumination of the
clock hands by fluorescent tubes is very rare. The amount was donated by
the military bishop Hermann Kunst, among others, who had made the
donation conditional on the clock being illuminated. On January 24,
2008, master clockmaker Ingo Zimmer put three clock motors out of
operation due to irreparable damage and set the clock hands at 12
o'clock. Only the clock on the east side continued to show the current
time. As part of the renovation of the building, which was completed in
2013, repairs and renovation work were carried out on the clocks, which
have since been illuminated with LED spotlights.
chapel
The
framing of the chapel is also made of glass blocks, but in a light color
with a few light blue sprinkles. The chapel itself is a pure steel
construction. A narrow strip of garden runs between the chapel and the
enclosure. A very small drawing of the suffering Christ by Ernst Barlach
embodies the altarpiece. The chapel cannot be visited and serves
internal community purposes.
Renovation and refurbishment since
2010
The old bell tower (the war ruins) has been renovated
several times. During the first renovation in the 1980s, the stones of
the ruin were sealed on the surface (hydrophobic treatment) and thus
damaged from the inside. After the dilapidation of the war ruins was
noticed in 2007, the old tower was conserved for restoration from
September 2010 to April 2015. In the process, facade joints were renewed
for around 4.4 million euros and the ruins, which are open on all sides,
were protected in such a way that rainwater and meltwater can be drained
off quickly.
Due to wear and tear and environmental influences,
the renovation of the chapel of the Memorial Church was due from
November 2015 to May 2017 with the help of the Wüstenrot Foundation for
1.4 million euros. The windows, façade, garden, heating, ventilation,
electrical and sanitary systems were all renovated.
Since July
2017, the floor in front of the Memorial Church (podium) has been
completely renovated for around 2.4 million euros and more than 100,000
new terracotta and concrete slabs have been laid.
Next up is the
renovation of the new tower, which has been scaffolded since 2014 for
substance analysis and planning of the difficult renovation of the
concrete building.
memorial against the war
Landmark ruined
tower
After the bombing in World War II, the ruined tower was left in
its destroyed state as a memorial for peace. In the course of time it
was in a structurally poor condition and required extensive renovation.
On the initiative of the parish and those responsible for the
preservation of the building ensemble, several Berlin companies have
come together to collect money to cover the renovation costs. The German
Foundation for Monument Protection also supported the renovation of the
ruined tower. Scaffolding of the old tower began in October 2010, and
interior renovation began in spring 2012. The main construction work was
completed in 2013, and the complex scaffolding has been dismantled in
several stages since August 2013.
Stalingrad Madonna in the
church
The interior of the church includes, among other things, the
drawing of the Madonna of Stalingrad, which Kurt Reuber made for
Christmas 1942 as a Wehrmacht doctor in the Battle of Stalingrad (today:
Volgograd). Next to the Stalingrad Madonna, as a sign of reconciliation,
there is also an icon-shaped Madonna and Child donated by the church in
Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad). Copies of the Stalingrad Madonna can be
found in various memorial sites, such as in a chapel in Coventry
Cathedral and in the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of Volgograd.
Memorial hall in the ruins
On January 7, 1987, on the occasion of
Berlin's 750th anniversary, the former entrance hall of the old building
was converted into a room commemorating the events and destruction of
World War II. One of the central exhibits here is the Coventry Cross of
Nails as a symbol of reconciliation.
The nails from which it was
formed come from the burnt roof beams of Coventry Cathedral, which was
destroyed in German air raids on 14th November 1940 and was also
deliberately kept in ruins.
The visitors come from all over the world. Depending on the season, there are around 3,000 to 10,000 people a day. In August 2015, 6% of the visitors came from Berlin, 40% from other German federal states and 49% from abroad. The rest did not answer the question. The blue light in the new church, the mosaics in the memorial hall and the theme of war and reconciliation were particularly impressive. When surveyed in August 2015, 70% of visitors to the New Church belonged to a Christian religion. A sixth of the visitors to the new church sat down, 10% used the time for prayer.
Use and Affiliation
The church is used by the Evangelical
Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church for services and events. The
community belongs to the church district of
Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf in the Berlin district of the Evangelical
Church Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia (EKBO).
Worship services and devotions
Sunday and public holiday, 10
a.m.: communion service, 6 p.m.: service
Worshipers during the
week: Monday to Friday 1pm, 5.30pm and 6pm in the Church, Friday 1pm
the Coventry Reconciliation Prayer in the Memorial Hall
Saturday,
6 p.m.: Bach cantata service or organ vespers
Known members of
the community
Gerhard Jacobi (1891–1971), later Bishop of
Oldenburg
Paul Conrad (1865-1927), 1st pastor, later
Oberdompreacher
Heinrich Reimann (1850–1906), organist and mentor
to Max Reger
Fritz Heitmann (1891–1953), organist and choir
director
Elisabeth Schmitz (1893–1977), member of the church
council 1933–1943 (?), resistance fighter from the ranks of the
Confessing Church
Friedrich von Kekulé (1930-2009), bearer of the
Federal Cross of Merit and Chairman of the Foundation of the Friends
of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church
Surroundings of the
Memorial Church
The podium of the Memorial Church is a 4700 m²
plateau and connects the church buildings with each other. It is
raised several steps above street level. It was designed in 1961 by
Egon Eiermann with colored round ceramic bricks. In 1981 the bricks
were replaced by cobblestones. In 2019 it was again fitted with
colored clay tiles up to 20 centimeters round and made waterproof.
The Goldener Riss memorial was created as a memorial to the
victims of the attack on the Berlin Christmas market at the Memorial
Church in 2016. The names of the victims are engraved on the steps
leading up to the podium of the church. Flowers and grave lights
bear witness to the mourners.
Movies
Mysterious places -
The Berlin Memorial Church. Shown in: ARD-Alpha, July 5, 2020, 8:15
p.m. - 9 p.m. (Old church - ruins, new church - Eiermann).