Jewish Museum Berlin
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 understand the history of Berlin without understanding the enormous contributions made by its Jewish citizens; the meaning of the Holocaust must be integrated into the consciousness and memory of the city of Berlin; and, finally, for its future, the City of Berlin and the country of Germany must acknowledge the erasure of Jewish life in its history.
The visitor enters the Baroque Kollegienhaus and then descends by stairway through the dramatic Entry Void, into the underground. The existing building is tied to the new extension, through the underground, thus preserving the contradictory autonomy of both the old and new structures on the surface. The descent leads to three underground axial routes, each of which tells a different story. The first leads to a dead end – the Holocaust Tower. The second leads out of the building and into the Garden of Exile and Emigration, remembering those who were forced to leave Berlin The third and longest, traces a path leading to the Stair of Continuity, then up to the exhibition spaces of the museum, emphasizing the continuum of history.
A Void cuts through the zigzagging plan of the new building and creates a space that embodies absence. It is a straight line whose impenetrability becomes the central focus around which exhibitions are organized. In order to move from one side of the museum to the other, visitors must cross one of the 60 bridges that open onto this void.
AWARDS
2010 – Buber-Rosenzweig Medal from DKR (German Coordinating Council of Societies for Christian-Jewish Cooperation)
1999 – The German Architecture Prize
1998 – The Best of 1998 – Art forum International
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World Trade Center Master Plan
In 2002, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) announced a competition for a master plan to develop the 16 acres in Lower Manhattan destroyed by the terrorist attack of 9/11. Studio Libeskind’s design, “Memory Foundations,” won the commission.
In designing the master site plan, Daniel Libeskind worked closely with all the stakeholders, knowing that it was fundamental to balance the memory of the tragedy with the need to foster a vibrant and working neighborhood. In the end, he devoted half of the 16-acre site to public space, defined by the Memorial and the Memorial Museum, while also setting aside locations for sustainable, high-tech office towers, re-connecting the historic street-grid, reinvigorating the streetscape with above-ground retail, reshaping the underground transit concourses and even finding room for two major new public facilities: an iconic new transportation station and a performing arts center.
The results are becoming visible with the opening of a 200-foot stretch of street and sidewalk on Greenwich Street, which hasn’t existed since the 1960s. The Memorial Museum opened in spring 2014, with underground galleries that reveal the slurry wall that withstood the terrorist attack and will forever remain as a testament to the strength of America’s foundations. One World Trade opened in early 2015 with the symbolic height of 1,776 feet. The Transportation Hub was completed in 2016 and Three World Trade was completed in 2018. Two World Trade is the next building in the master plan to be constructed.
Studio Libeskind has been coordinating with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, City of New York, and the architects of the individual buildings to realize the master plan.
AWARDS
2018 – CTBUH Urban Habitat Award
2012 – AIA National Service Medal
2004 – Best of New York Award, for the ‘Building of New York’, Hosted by the New York City College of Technology Foundation, New York, USA
Nokia Arena and Residential Towers
The Nokia Arena project is an ambitious urban renewal project, situated at a pivotal location within Tampere, Finland. It stitches the urban fabric back together across an existing railway and connects East to West, creating a new vibrant hub of high quality living, working, leisure and culture for the city and Finland. The mixed-use program consists of a multi-purpose ice hockey arena with a hotel, five adjacent towers with a podium that includes residences, retail and offices.
The arena, which occupies one fifth of the complex, will have the capacity to accommodate 17,000 visitors. With its casino, bars and restaurant at deck level, the arena redefines its pivotal function as a hub for diverse urban activities. There is approximately 82,000 square meters of mixed-use program; including 64,500 square meters of arena space, 5800 square meters for a practice hall and 11,600 square meters hotel with three rooftop saunas.
“My goal was to reflect a 21st sensibility of living within a high-density sustainable lifestyle. The series of buildings each has its own unique identity and as a whole create a dynamic urban skyline that reflects light, color and form. Like a precious gemstones on a crown the forms crystallize in a richness of contemporary urban living.” —Daniel Libeskind
The Nokia Arena opened in December 2021. The towers are currently under construction.
More about this projectCityLife, PwC Tower
The PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Tower designed by Studio Libeskind, completes the business district of the CityLife master plan in Milan. Close to the center of the new grand central park it is one of three iconic commercial high rise buildings and is situated between towers designed by Zaha Hadid Architects and Arata Isozaki & Associates who won the competition in conjunction with Studio Libeskind in 2004.
The PwC Tower draws on the sphere for inspiration and slopes inward towards its counterparts and the central park below. PricewaterhouseCoopers will become the single tenant of the Libeskind-designed Tower at CityLife and will house 3,000 professionals, 500 staff, and four service lines for customers. The curved tower’s facade is made of sustainable, state of the art glass, that will reflect the public space below and vistas around. It is personally crafted and conceived to provide a sculpted and highly visible skyline on the site. The tower has been created in line with state-of-the-art building and environmental sustainability criteria, making it one of the most recognizable buildings of the new Milan skyline.
The designs of each of the skyscrapers go beyond superficial treatments of facades and create a spatial and functional disposition of spaces with extraordinary internal vistas and internal activities for the users. At the base of each tower there is retail and particular public amenities which help to dissolve the boundary between the public and private commercial realm. The towers have been carefully positioned in order to provide appropriate shade, maximum light and a pleasant atmosphere at the pedestrian level. This allows for the new piazza to be a huge amenity for both the new housing inhabitants and the workers in the office complexes.
Construction began in 2016 and was completed at the end of 2020.
AWARDS
2020 – Emporis Skyscraper Award (4th)
2006 – CTBUH Conference Featured Tower
Links:
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Dutch Holocaust Memorial of Names
Situated along the Weesperstraat, an important axis within the Jewish Cultural Quarter, the Dutch Holocaust Memorial of Names is adjacent to the Hermitage Museum, East of the Diaconie’s verdant Hoftuin garden and café, just a stone’s throw from the Amstel River and in close proximity to important Jewish cultural institutions such as the Jewish Historical Museum and the Portuguese Synagogue.
The 1,550 square meter memorial incorporates four volumes that represent the letters in the Hebrew word לזכר meaning “In Memory of”. The volumes are arranged in a rectilinear configuration on the north-south axis of the main thoroughfare Weesperstraat and the Hoftuin pavilion to the East.
As visitors enter the memorial they will encounter a labyrinth of passages articulated by two-meter-high brick walls carrying the message of Remembrance. Each of the four volumes is crafted from mirror-finished stainless steel that hovers above the walls of individually stacked bricks. 102,000 bricks are each inscribed with a name, giving a tangible quantification to the many casualties, as well as leaving 1000 blank bricks that will memorialize the unknown victims.
For more information about the memorial visit: www.holocaustnamenmonument.nl
Construction started in 2019. The project opened on September 19, 2021.
Watch a video tour here
Awards:
Architectural Review Public Awards, shortlist, 2022
Gouden Piramide 2022 (Golden Pyramid), nomination shortlist
BNA Beste Gebouw van het Jaar (Best Building of the Year), Honorable mention, 2022
Selected for Architecture in the Netherlands Yearbook, 2022
Architizer A+ Awards, Popular Choice Winner, 2022
Arcam Amsterdam Architecture Prize 2022
“In a refined way, the building is very grand, present and monumental from some points of view, but from other points of view, restrained, sometimes even absent and actually always refined. Despite its physically modest size, the impact of this project reaches far beyond the city limits and is not only for Amsterdam and its citizens, but also provides a space for encounter, reflection and education. This is Architecture with a big ‘A’.” – excerpt from Arcam Jury
More about this projectA short film on the Dutch Holocaust Memorial of Names
A video tour through the Dutch Holocaust Memorial of Names
More about this articleDreams of Freedom. Romanticism in Germany and Russia
Studio Libeskind was engaged by the organizers to create an exhibition design for the exhibition “Dreams of Freedom. Romanticism in Germany and Russia” that will be at the Tretyakoy Gallery in Moscow and the … in Dresden, Germany, respectively. The design by Architect Daniel Libeskind is a response to the masterpieces of works by the greatest artists of the first quarter of the 19th century: Caspar David Friedrich, Philipp Otto Runge, Johann Overbeck, Alexander Ivanov, Alexei Venetsianov, Orest Kiprensky, Karl Bryullov and others. A key idea was to create a space that will give a visceral sense of the Romantic artists and their quests through the way a visitor moves through the space.
As visitors enter the galleries, they embark on a journey through two interlaced spirals that create a series of oblique and intimate gallery spaces within the labyrinth. Libeskind envisioned an imaginary line between Dresden and Moscow to create a coordinated system of axes that gives the visitor a compass to orient themselves between the two cities—as well as between two analogous states of mind. The visitor has both clarity and uncertainty in navigating the exhibits, echoing the power and dynamism of Romanticism. Red passageways, black and grey blocks of color, and bold graphic lettering on the walls create a dramatic series of gallery spaces that guide and inform the visitor through the exhibition.
Visitors will encounter more than 350 works of art, including approximately 200 paintings, supplemented by archival materials and unique exhibits from dozens of German and Russian collections.
The exposition was developed by experts from the Tretyakov Gallery and Dresden museums and will be displayed in two installations, one in Moscow and the other in Dresden.
Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, Russia: April 23, 2021 to August 8, 2021
Albertium at the SK Museum in Dresden, Germany: October 2, 2021 to February 6, 2022
Studio Weil: A Discussion on Design Inspiration
Architect Daniel Libeskind talks about his design for the Studio Weil building in Mallorca, Spain. The project was completed in 2003.
See more here: Studio Weil
Forever Marked by the Day, Muscarelle Musuem of Art
The new World Trade Center is a space of remembering and healing, as well as a tribute to life and art. This place serves as a memorial designed to honor people and commemorate heroes and connects the past and the future to the present through architecture. The buildings and spaces designed by Daniel Libeskind, Michael Arad, David Childs, and Santiago Calatrava function as channels to find new purpose and peace after the attacks on September 11, 2001. Forever Marked by the Day pays homage to those architects, artists, designers, and photographers who made creativity triumph over destruction.
Aedes Architecture Forum: Dialogue Concert Series #3
Chamberworks is a set of 28 drawings created by Daniel Libeskind during the years in which he served as the head of the Architecture Department at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan in the early 1980s. The drawings explore the relationship between music and architecture.
Christopher Dell conceives these as “a strategic performative approach to work constructively, and non-arbitrarily with indeterminacy. In this sense Formblocks serve as a lens through which the Chamberworks are musically read as scores.”
On the occasion of Aedes Architecture Forum’s 40th anniversary, the series Dialogue Concerts. Conceptual Research on Architecture and Music presents a pluralistic media format, re-envisioning urban research. Architectural practice will enter into a dialogue with musical praxis.
Architectural Record: Daniel Libeskind First Architect Awarded the Dresden International Peace Prize
On February 19, Polish-American architect Daniel Libeskind will be presented with the 14th Dresden International Peace Prize—or, simply, the Dresden Prize—at the Semperoper, an opulent 19th-century opera house located steps from the Elbe River in the war-ravaged-and-rebuilt core of the German city that shares the prize’s name.
More about this articleThis nonprofit is putting senior citizens in affordable starchitect-designed apartments
A new Daniel Libeskind-designed apartment building is set to open in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood in 2023. They’re being developed in partnership with Selfhelp Realty Group, a Manhattan-based nonprofit that specializes in affordable housing for seniors.
More about this articleDaniel Libeskind’s Museum of Military History “is a symbol of the resurrection”
In a series on deconstructivism we look at Daniel Libeskind’s extension to the Museum of Military History in Dresden, Germany, which features a pointed steel and glass shard that thrusts through the original building’s neoclassical facade.
More about this articleExclusive Look at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Building Redesign
After the mass murder in October 2018, the inimitable architect spent months speaking with survivors and victims’ families before drafting his design.
More about this articleOn Creating a Sense Of Intimacy
Ten key topics accompany the first issue of Spacial Magazine, which was discussed with leading architect, designer and philosopher of space, Daniel Libeskind. His opening essay frames the entire issue and looks at its scope from different angles.
More about this articleDaniel Libeskind
An international figure in architecture and urban design, Daniel Libeskind is renowned for his ability to evoke cultural memory in buildings. Informed by a deep commitment to music, philosophy, literature, and poetry, Mr. Libeskind aims to create resonant, unique, and sustainable architecture.
Born in Lód’z, Poland, in 1946, Mr. Libeskind immigrated to the United States as a teenager and, with his family, settled in the Bronx. He received the American-Israel Cultural Foundation Scholarship and performed as a musical virtuoso, before eventually leaving music to study architecture. He received his professional degree in architecture from the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in 1970 and a postgraduate degree in the history and theory of architecture from the School of Comparative Studies at Essex University in England in 1972.
In 1989, Mr. Libeskind won the international competition to build the Jewish Museum in Berlin. He moved his young family to Berlin and devoted more than a decade to the completion of this seminal design. A series of influential museum commissions followed, including the Felix Nussbaum Haus, Osnabrück; Imperial War Museum North, Manchester; Denver Art Museum; Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco; Danish Jewish Museum, Copenhagen; Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto; and the Military History Museum, Dresden.
In 2003, Studio Libeskind won another historic competition—to create a master plan for the rebuilding of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan. In addition to a towering spire of 1,776 feet, the Libeskind design study proposed a complex program encompassing a memorial, an underground museum, the integration of the slurry wall, a unique transit hub, and four office towers. This plan is being realized today.
Upon his move to New York, Studio Libeskind quickly became involved with designing and realizing a large number of commercial centers, such as Westside in Bern, the Crystals at City Center in Las Vegas, and Ko-Bogen in Düsseldorf, as well as residential towers in Busan, Singapore, Warsaw, Toronto, Manila, and Sao Paulo.
As Principal Design Architect for Studio Libeskind, Mr. Libeskind speaks widely on the art of architecture in universities and professional summits. His architecture and ideas have been the subject of many articles and exhibitions, influencing architecture and the development of cities and culture.
Mr. Libeskind lives in New York with his wife and business partner, Nina Libeskind. He is a licensed architect in the State of New York.
Nina Libeskind
Carla Swickerath
Since joining Studio Libeskind in 1999, Carla Swickerath has gained diverse experience in cultural, civic, retail, commercial, residential, and planning projects around the world. She has led many of the Studio’s successful project teams from concept design through to completion—including the Crystals retail complex at CityCenter in Las Vegas, the Hyundai Haeundae Udong I-Park residential development in Busan, Korea, and the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco.
Ms. Swickerath has also led the complex World Trade Center redevelopment process from the initial competition phase to the present. Today, her dual management and design skills come into play as she oversees all aspects of operations at Studio Libeskind. Ms. Swickerath leads many of the Studio’s projects, coordinating the design team and consultants, liaising with clients and client representatives, and managing project budgets and schedules.
She earned a Master’s in Architecture from the University of Michigan, following undergraduate studies in English and Art History at the University of Florida. She has taught at the Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weißensee in Berlin and the University of Michigan. Carla speaks publicly on architecture, design, and planning.
Stefan Blach
Stefan has over two decades of experience managing some of the Studio’s most complex large-scale projects around the globe. Stefan has led design and consultant teams to reach these goals in various cultural, residential, and commercial developments. This includes the development and completion of the acclaimed Jewish Museum Berlin; the urban rejuvenation development of the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre, and Grand Canal Commercial Development in Dublin; the LEED Platinum certified Kö-Bogen retail and office complex in Dusseldorf, Germany; and the award-winning MO Modern Art Museum in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Stefan looks at each project and reviews the complexity and nuances of the program and site to find creative solutions using simple and practical methods that deliver projects at the highest quality and on budget. He is currently managing the new museum design of the Museo Regional de Tarapacá in Chile, a housing development in Frankfurt, the urban development for the Central Deck and Arena and adjacent mixed-use in Tampere, Finland, as well as several ongoing commercial and cultural projects in Europe and Asia.
Stefan has previous experience working independently with renowned architects such as Tim Heide from Berlin and Salvador Pérez Arroyo from Madrid on projects like the Museo de la Ciencia en Cuenca before joining Studio Libeskind. He obtained a Diploma in Architecture from Technische Universität, Berlin in 1991. Stefan speaks German, and English and is proficient in Spanish.
Yama Karim
Yama Karim serves as a team leader on many of the Studio’s most complicated large-scale projects including the master plan and redevelopment of the former fairgrounds in Milan, CityLife, which is currently under construction; the World Trade Center masterplan; and Reflections and Corals residential developments in Singapore. He is leading the development of several high-rise towers including the Artery Tower in Vilnius, and the Baccarat Hotel in Dubai, as well as, the Albert Einstein Archives a cultural project in Israel.
Before joining Studio Libeskind’s New York office in 2003, Yama Karim had already collaborated with Daniel Libeskind for several years in the late 1990s in Berlin. He has brought extraordinary experience to the Studio, having served first as a senior designer at Polshek Partnership (now Ennead Architects) where he worked on the Brown Fine Arts Center at Smith College, Massachusetts, and the Sarah Lawrence College Monica A. and Charles A. Heimbold Jr. Visual Arts Center, New York, among others. He also worked at Reiser + Umemoto (RUR) in New York, where he served on the team for the Kaohsiung Port Terminal in Taiwan.
Yama has taught full-time at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich and as a visiting professor at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. He graduated from Columbia University with a Master in Architecture in 1995 and from the University of California, Berkeley, with a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Design in 1991. Yama speaks widely on architecture, design, sustainability, and urban planning. Yama speaks English and Farsi.