BERLIN, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Meinhard von Gerkan, one in all Germany’s most well-known architects who designed Berlin’s Tegel Airport and the capital’s major railway station, has died at age 87, his workplace stated on Thursday.
Born in Riga, Latvia in 1935, von Gerkan grew up as a foster little one in Hamburg after his father was killed on the japanese entrance throughout World Battle Two and his mom died quickly afterward whereas fleeing as a refugee from Poland.
A 12 months after graduating from his structure research in 1964, von Gerkan based a partnership with Volkwin Marg, which survives underneath the identify “von Gerkan, Marg und Associate” (gmp).
They quickly gained an award for designing Tegel Airport, one of many major gateways linking West Berlin, then an exclave of democratic West Germany deep inside Communist East Germany, with the remainder of the world. The airport closed in 2020.
Von Gerkan additionally designed Berlin’s major railway station, which is close to the chancellery and close by of the Reichstag parliament’s glass cupola, although he fell out with rail operator Deutsche Bahn, which he stated mutilated his design.
Von Gerkan’s design envisaged a vaulted ceiling for the underground part of the station, however Deutsche Bahn, underneath stress to complete the work in time for the 2006 soccer World Cup, selected a flat steel roof as a substitute.
Von Gerkan stated Deutsche Bahn had made the underground corridor appear like a grocery store when it ought to have been an undulating, cathedral-like area.
“That is simply pure disfigurement,” he stated.
In 2008, Bahn and von Gerkan settled their dispute, with the rail operator paying an undisclosed sum to a basis arrange by the architect’s workplace.
Writing by Paul Carrel
Modifying by Mark Heinrich
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