IN-PERSON ISTANBUL HERITAGE(S)

Abstract

Following the modern principle “light, air, and sun,” Walter Schwagenscheidt and Tassilo Sittmann—the architects of the 1960s large housing estate “Frankfurt Nordweststadt” in West Germany—developed a high-density housing layout that visually extended the domestic sphere of apartments into luscious green public spaces. On the other hand, by referencing and potentially romanticizing Mediterranean cities and by paying tribute to the old city of Frankfurt “lost to the war,” the architects also laid ground for a prospective bustling neighborhood life filling these public spaces of the settlement. They created a contradiction by design, materializing in a continuous pastoral landscape serving as a prominent example of current polarizing debates around public spaces in modernist housing estates in general: it remains controversial whether they are spaces of urban “emptiness,” hence subject to densification, or modernist landmarks of historical, ecological, and individual significance, yet to be preserved—pointing at the differences between public image and insider’s perspectives. Answering to the question of how the materialization of past ideals and norms in Germany’s post-war modern settlements shapes current dwelling practices, my presentation will focus on rival intentions for public spaces. Showcasing the competing design ideas through historical planning and text material, my research will expand on how this conflict has shifted over the past decades by mapping remnants of original materializations and regulatory refigurations. Gradually it will arrive at the mundane strategies of current inhabitants negotiating this discrepancy on a daily basis. The presentation is part of my ongoing PhD project, “The Spatiality of Housing and Communalization,” embedded in the research project “Large Housing Estates in Transition—Intersectional Perspectives on Resident Behavior and Needs” at Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, funded by the German Research Foundation.