Monument to Freedom and Unity

[1] The decree proposed the site of the former National Kaiser Wilhelm Monument on the Schlossfreiheit for the new structure, next to the Berlin Palace containing the Humboldt Forum which was rebuilt between 2013 and 2020.

On the 13 May 1998, after the conclusion of the competition for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin, Florian Mausbach, Günter Nooke, Jürgern Engert and Lothar de Maizière began the "German Unity Memorial" (Denkmal Deutsche Einheit) initiative by writing a letter to the President of the Bundestag Rita Süssmuth, the Chancellor Helmut Kohl, the President of the German Bundesrat Gerhard Schröder and the Mayor of Berlin Eberhard Diepgen.

In April 2000, a cross-party group of East German parliamentarians made an application to the Bundestag, which was rejected by the Committee on Cultural and Media Affairs.

The competition attracted 532 submissions from Germany and the rest of the world, including Jonathan Borofsky, Gottfried Böhm, Axel Schultes, Rob Krier, Waldemar Otto, and GRAFT.

However, when the 19-person jury met on the 27 April 2009 to decide which submissions would advance, they were unable to form an absolute majority in support of any of the proposals, and the competition was cancelled.

[10] However, members of the media, public and industry organisations, as well as individual jurors identified excellent proposals among the submissions, which effectively engaged with the historical issues.

[11] Other critics blamed the high-bar of only advancing proposals to the second round if they achieved an absolute majority, which was not a legal requirement, as well as the size of the jury for its failure.

On 3 October 2010 in Berlin, the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture Bernd Neumann announced the results of the competition: three equally ranked prizes, and two marks of recognition were awarded.

The two marks of recognition were given to Xavier Veilhan, in collaboration with BP architectures, Paris, and realities:united (Jan and Tim Edler, working with Bjarke Ingels Group, Copenhagen).

Sebastian Letz (of Milla and Partner)'s proposal Bürger in Bewegung (Citizens in Motion) is a basin which can be walked into, 50 m long, with 700 sq m of accessible surface area and a total weight of 150 tonnes.

The protest slogans from the Monday demonstrations are written on the upper side of the basin, which is made of bound gravel to reduce the risk of slipping: "Wir sind das Volk.