Walter-Gropius-Haus (Berlin)

The Walter Gropius House (also known as "Gropiushaus") is a residential building with nine floors and 66 apartments at the Händelallee 1-9 in Berlin Hansaviertel, bordering its central Grosser Tiergarten park.

The architects involved in the Interbau were exclusively world-famous modernists, including Alvar Aalto, Egon Eiermann, Walter Gropius, Arne Jacobsen, Vasily Luckhardt, Oscar Niemeyer, Sep Ruf, Max Taut and Le Corbusier.

[3] Characteristic features of the Walter Gropius house are its concave structure, textured facade and distinctive narrow sides.

It stands in stark contrast to the formal and functional rigor of the Bauhaus housing projects realized by Walter Gropius before the Second World War.

The north side is less colorful than the southern main view but features subtly differentiated surfaces: the height of the four staircase towers is emphasized by vertical grooves.

For this reason, and also because of the pulling power of the name Gropius, the building was positioned as a public magnet close to the south-western main entrance of Interbau.

[6] The green spaces of the entire Hansaviertel were conceived as an integrated masterplan within the framework of Interbau and were executed by ten internationally renowned landscape architects.

The city planning concept articulated this as one of its main goal: "Within a few years the new Hansaviertel will have fully grown into the Tiergarten".

[7] The green spaces originally set up for Interbau in the surroundings of the Walter Gropius House (Section I) have been by the garden architects Herrmann Mattern (Kassel) and René Pechère (Brussels).