Alfred Messel (22 July 1853 – 24 March 1909) was a German architect at the turning point to the 20th century, creating a new style for buildings which bridged the transition from historicism to modernism.

In 1872, Messel graduated from the Ludwig-Georgs-Gymnasium in Darmstadt with an Abitur, after which he served in the military as a one-year volunteer in the First Grand Ducal Hessian Royal Guard Infantry Regiment.

In 1873, he attended the Kassel art academy together with his friend Ludwig Hoffmann, followed by architectural studies at the Berlin Bauakademie (which would later become the Technische Hochschule Charlottenburg) under Heinrich Strack and Richard Lucae.

[3] As a civil service trainee, he then contributed to a new post office administration building on Spandauer Straße in Berlin designed by the architect Carl Schwatlo, before successfully passing his second state examination qualifying him as an assessor.

In 1907, he was officially appointed architect of the Royal Prussian Museums and worked until his death primarily on plans for a new building to house the German, Pergamon and Near East collections in Berlin.

Already during construction, the nighttime electric lighting and steel scaffolding caused a sensation, and when the store opened on 15 November 15 1897, the result was traffic chaos on Leipziger Strasse as well as the beginning of Messel's rise to become one of the most prominent German architects of his time.

The innovative, vertically structured facade of narrow pillars extending from the ground floor to the roof and interspersed with windows received high praise, not least because it alluded to the building's function.

The tremendous impact of the new department store on the general public as well as on architecture experts is documented in numerous newspaper and magazine articles and statements by famous architects and their critics.

It was constructed with slight modifications between 1910 and 1930 under the supervision of Messel's close friend, the architect and city planning official Ludwig Hoffmann.

[5] The museum's external monumentality is in the same spirit as many of the relics on display inside, not least the reconstruction of the imposing western side of the Pergamon Altar itself with its three wings.