Köllnischer Park
It was redesigned as a public park in 1869–1873 and was further modified in the 20th century with the addition of first a bear enclosure, the Bärenzwinger, and later a permanent exhibition of sculpture, the Lapidary.
The western edge is dominated by a large office building built in 1903/04 as the headquarters of the Landsversicherungsanstalt, which has been used for the past few years by the Department of Urban Development of the Senate of Berlin, and the southern by the 1931/32 building of the German health insurance group Allgemeine Ortskrankenkasse, which under the German Democratic Republic was the Parteihochschule Karl Marx.
[4] Following the decision by Frederick William, the 'Great Elector' to encircle Berlin with fortifications, this became the location of Bastion VII,[2] which was known at the time as "the bulwerk in the morass'.
After such lengthy construction, the works were already out of date militarily, and after 1700 served only to control the comings and goings of visitors and residents, prevent desertion, and enable the collection of tolls on those entering the city.
[5] In 1736, Frederick William I gave the site of the park and the Märkisches Museum to one of his generals, Friedrich Sebastian Winnibald Truchseß, Count of Waldburg, who built a house there and laid out an extensive garden.
[6] After his death in the Battle of Hohenfriedberg, David Splitgerber, a merchant and banker, bought the land and was given the remaining eastern bastion section; from 1750 onwards, he operated Berlin's first sugar processing plant on the site, and also enlarged and improved the garden.
[1][6] In 1779, the baroque garden was mentioned by the bookseller and author Friedrich Nicolai: "It has very charming areas, in particular it includes an open pavilion on a rise, which is small, but has tall trees growing upon it".
[1] The last major modification of the park took place in 1969–71 to designs by Eberhard Jaenisch, Stefan Rauner and Roswitha Schulz:[12] a mound which remained on the site of the bastion was levelled, a children's playground was added, a terrace was built behind the museum, and the Lapidary was created.
Bär in this case derives from the Latin berum, meaning "weir",[2] and it was apparently named for Wusterhausen because the road to that town passed by its original location at Bastion VII.
It was designed by Ludwig Hoffmann as a complex of buildings representing architecture of the Mark Brandenburg and North Germany in general in the Romanesque, Gothic, and Renaissance periods.
This was built in 1938–39 on the site of a former sanitation depot, also designed by Ludwig Hoffmann and already decorated with more than 50 plaques by Otto Lessing depicting bears.
The Lord Mayor, Julius Lippert, saw to its completion despite objections from some Nazi functionaries that there were more important things to be done in what proved to be the run-up to World War II.
[25][26] It remains largely unchanged, although it had to be reconstructed after the war; it reopened in 1949 with two new bears, again from Bern; one of these, Jente, produced 33 cubs (including 4 sets of triplets and 9 pairs of twins) before being retired to the zoo.
[39] Built in 1903/04, the building echoes the Märkisches Museum, which was built at the same time, in the use of red brick on its façade and is in Expressionist-Baroque style, with giant pilasters which rise uninterrupted from the street to the roofline,[40][41] between which are limestone decorative elements in the form of similated balustrades, allegorical figures, and cartouches with craft symbols, such as an iron between pairs of scissors.
[2][49] The façade is "an outstanding example of late Expressionist architecture",[50] featuring decorative brickwork and pillars, of which the six on the flanking staircase sections are emphasised by terracotta statues.
[57] The buildings had an "English-industrial" appearance and were horizontally organised with a taller central section giving an impression of "importance, balance and pragmatism" and ornamented with round arches over doors and windows and an acorn motif.
