The Jewish Museum Berlin, which opened to the public in 2001, exhibits the social, political and cultural history of the Jews in Germany from the fourth century to the present, explicitly presenting and integrating, for the first time in postwar Germany, the repercussions of the Holocaust. The new building is housed next to the site of the original Prussian Court of Justice building which was completed in 1735 now serves as the entrance to the new building. Daniel Libeskind’s design, which was created a year before the Berlin Wall came down, was based on three insights:  it is impossible to…

Kö-Bogen, or the `King’s Bow,’ is a LEED Platinum rated large-scale office and retail complex whose sinuous form hugs the point where the Königsallee Boulevard, Düsseldorf’s primary thoroughfare, converges with the newly created Hofgarten promenade. By artfully connecting the city’s central park and historic commercial center—and by expanding public space and inserting landscape elements—Studio Libeskind produced a mixed-use commercial complex that is a dynamic new attraction in the heart of Düsseldorf, Germany. The complex sits on two plots, comprised of two structures—one to the east, the other to the west—separated on the ground by a central pedestrian passageway and joined…

Now the official museum of the German Armed Forces, the Dresden Museum of Military History has assumed varying and contradictory identities across its history. The building began its life as an armory, before becoming the Saxon Army Museum, followed by a stint as a Nazi military museum, then a Soviet and East German Museum. Uncertain of the institution’s role in the reunified state, the German government closed the museum and launched an international competition to redesign the structure. Studio Libeskind was selected as design architect for the extension in 2001, after presenting a bold design outside the competition guidelines. The…

Daniel Libeskind was invited to return to the Felix Nussbaum Haus in Osnabrück, Germany, his first completed project, to design an extension 13 years after the museum’s opening. Attached to the Kunstgeschichtliche Museum and connected to the Felix Nussbaum Haus by a glass bridge, the new building transforms the existing buildings into a cohesive complex by acting as a gateway. Studio Libeskind employed grey plaster and anthracite frames to harmonizes with the existing buildings and create a seamless ensemble. The extension appears less as an additional element as it does a prism from which the original Libeskind-designed building is refracted from…

Dedicated to the oeuvre of a Jewish artist put to death at Auschwitz, the Felix Nussbaum Museum is an extension to the Cultural History Museum in Osnabrück, Germany, where Felix Nussbaum was born in 1904. As well as displaying paintings created by Nussbaum, the museum presents changing exhibitions focusing on the themes of racism and intolerance. With sudden breaks in its pathways, unpredictable intersections, claustrophobic spaces, and dead ends, the structure of the building reflects the Nussbaum’s predicament as a Jewish painter in Germany before WWII. The museum is composed of three interconnected structures, each referencing a different temporality in…

The new Forum at Leuphana University of Lüneburg, designed in collaboration with Daniel Libeskind, provides the campus with a landmark building that promotes the vision of innovation and excellence for the university. The building integrates the Research Center, the Student Center, the Seminar Center and the Auditorium into one single structure. This new configuration promotes cross disciplinary interaction and a dynamic learning environment for the students and faculty alike. Each of the functions are housed in four individually shaped and mutually interlinking volumes that form a major composite structure achieving the maximum efficiency in terms of usage, structure, energy consumption…

Almost 13 years after Daniel Libeskind’s extension to the Jewish Museum Berlin opened to great acclaim in 2001, the museum unveiled its third collaboration with the architect, the Academy of the Jewish Museum Berlin. The one-floor, 25,000-square-foot building is located on the historic site of the Blumengrossmarkt (flower market) across the street from the Jewish Museum Berlin. Entitled “In-Between Spaces,” the design links the building to the museum’s other structures and open spaces both thematically and structurally. Visitors enter through a downward thrusting cube that intersects with the main rectangular hall, suggestive of the original Kollegienhaus building and the Libeskind-designed…

This 7,000 square foot addition to the Jewish Museum in Berlin is located in the courtyard of the historical building, “Kollegienhaus”, which was built in 1735. The museum needed a multifunctional space that would provide additional room for the museum’s restaurant and extend the lobby to provide event space for lectures, concerts, and dinners. The distinctive architecture of the addition creates a space that can be used throughout the year while preserving the courtyard qualities of the baroque building.  Within the columns supporting the roof, there is a sophisticated sound system and within the enclosure itself, a stage rises from…