History KMA I

The section of Frankfurter Allee between Proskauer Straße and Strausberger Platz – called Stalinallee from 1949 on– was rebuilt in the National Traditions rebuilding style. This was done using bricks recycled from rubble after the war.

The impressive boulevard boasted a variety of shops, gourmet restaurants and spacious apartments behind richly ornamented, prestigious façades.

At the heart of the avenue stood the Deutsche Sporthalle and a Stalin monument. After Stalin’s death, his successor Khrushchev ordered a transition to the industrialist architecture style.

1949

Foundation of two German states: 23 May: Federal Republic of Germany; 7 October: GDR

Public presentation of the collective plan: Visualisation of a lightly built-up urban landscape for Berlin as a whole (architect: Hans Scharoun)

Frankfurter Allee renamed Stalinallee on 21 December

Collective plan, drawn up by the planning collective under the leadershipof Hans Scharoun for the Municipal Administration of Berlin, 1946

S-Bahn station Stalinallee, street naming 1949–1961 (today Frankfurter Allee)

Balcony access building shortly after completion

1948–1949

Planning of the Wohnzelle Friedrichshain residential unit as part of the collective plan (architect: Hans Scharoun); construction of the first balcony access buildings on Frankfurter Allee in the New Objectivity style (architect: Ludmilla Herzenstein)

Currency reform; Soviet blockade of West Berlin; Airlift

Air bridge aircraft at Tempelhof Airport

1950

A delegation of architects from Berlin travels to Moscow to study the socialist style of nationally inspired building; ‘16 principles of urban development’ inform the transition of architecture from modernism to the National Traditions building style in the GDR

Departure of architects Leucht, Collein, Bolz, Adler, Piesternick, Liebknecht (from left to right) to Moscow

1950–1953

Korean War and division into North and South Korea

1951

Planning and construction of the Deutsche Sporthalle (German Sports Centre) (architect: Richard Paulick); Opened at the third World Youth Games on 2 August

Deutsche Sporthalle (German Sports Centre) with a view along the avenue to the east

High-rise at Weberwiese

1952

Construction of the high-rise building at Weberwiese as a model for the design of the rest of Stalinallee (architect: Hermann Henselmann)

Popular Uprising on 17 June 1953, protesters in Stalinallee

1953

Death of Joseph Stalin on 5 March; Popular Uprising in East Berlin and in the GDR on 17 June

1953–1958

Planning of the continuation of Stalinallee from Strausberger Platz to Alexanderplatz in the National Traditions building style (architects: Henselmann collective, Hopp, Paulick, Leucht, Hartmann, Souradny)

View of the avenue from Haus des Kindes via Strausberger Platz

1955

Federal Republic joins NATO and Warsaw Pact established on 9 May and 14 May respectively

1956

Nikita Khrushchev criticises Stalin’s crimes against humanity at the 20th Conference of the Soviet Communist Party; start of De-Stalinisation

1957

Interbau International Architecture Exhibition in the Hansaviertel district on the reconstruction of West Berlin in a modernist style

Residential building at Klopstockstraße 14–18, Hansaviertel district, architect: Pierre Vago

1961

Demolition of the Stalin monument and renaming of Stalinallee to Karl-Marx-Allee on 13 November

1972

Demolition of the dilapidated Deutsche Sporthalle

Demolition of the Deutsche Sporthalle (German Sports Centre)