Friedrichstadt (Berlin)

Friedrichstadt was an independent suburb of Berlin, and is now a historical neighborhood of the city itself. The neighborhood is named after the Prussian king Frederick I.

Geography

Friedrichstadt is located south of the Dorotheenstadt neighborhood, and southwest of the historical suburb of Friedrichswerder. It is located south of the twin-city zone of Berlin and Cölln. Today, the northern part of the neighborhood is located in the borough of Berlin-Mitte, while the southern part of the neighborhood is located in borough of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg. The border between the two boroughs runs along the southern side of Niederkirchner and Zimmer streets.

The official boundaries of Friedrichstadt extend from the Spittelmarkt starting between northbound Niederwall and Oberwall streets, along Behren street west to Ebert street, and then south over the Potsdamer Platz, Stresemann and Gitschiner streets, ending at the Hallesches Tor, and then again north over Linden and Axel-Springer streets, back to the Spittelmarkt. A large portion of the Spittelmarkt and adjoining Hausvogtei Plaza were once part of a military installation associated with the historical suburb of Friedrichswerder.

History

After the death of prince-elector Frederick William of Brandenburg in 1688, his son, prince-elector Friedrich III, later king Frederick I of Prussia, was allowed to establish a new city on the outskirts of Cölln, one of the precursor cities of modern-day Berlin. In order to assist with the street layout and the placement of buildings and houses, various architects and engineers, including Johann Nering, Johann Behr, and Martin Grünberg were called in. The new city was founded in 1691. Friedrichstadt was the third expansion of the Berlin-Cölln city center, after Dorotheenstadt and Friedrichswerder. Friedrichstadt was built outside of the Berlin's fortifications, south of Dorotheenstadt and west of Friedrichswerder. However, the city was protected both by the militia of Leipzig and a lengthening of the western city wall of Dorotheenstadt. Today, this is the site of Mauer (English: Wall) Street. Toward the south, Friedrichstadt extended to the present-day Zimmer street. From that southern point, the city extended approximately to the fortifications of the city of Neu-Cölln. To enter the city from Friedrichswerder, one entered through the Leipziger Tor (English: Gate of Leipzig), and to enter from Dorotheenstadt, one came through the Friedrichs-Tor. This new area of the city, however, was not referred to as Friedrichstadt until 1706, fifteen years after its founding.

Friedrichstadt was designed with an unusually austere geometric style for the time, with broad streets which intersected at right angles to each other. Because the ground upon which the new neighborhood was to be built was boggy and unstable, many houses in the city had to be built on stilts and stakes. As a result of government sponsored building rush, 300 houses stood in Friedrichstadt in 1692, just one year after its founding. Many settlers in the city were Huguenots seeking refuge from the French government. To accommodate the German and French settlers, ground was broken on the constructions of two large churches, one French, and one German, in 1701. Construction of new homes continued in the city until 1708. In 1711 at the corner of Jäger and Markgrafen streets a new building for the "Societät der Wissenschaften" (English: Society of the Sciences), founded by Gottfried Leibniz, opened. Today the building is occupied by the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften (English: Scientific Academy of Berlin and Brandenburg), which is the third oldest scientific academy in Europe.

Through a royal decree issued by king Frederick I on January 18, 1709 Friedrichstadt, along with the cities of Berlin, Cölln, Friedrichswerder, and Dorotheenstadt were to be consolidated into the "Königlichen Haupt- und Residenzstadt Berlin" (English: Royal Residence and Capital City of Berlin), effective January 1, 1710. With that, the independence of Friedrichstadt ended, as it was incorporated as a part of the new Berlin.

After Frederick I's son, Frederick William I became king, he allowed Berlin, and the Friedrichstadt neighborhood, to grow considerably. In the 1720s, a new fortified wall was to be constructed. The main construction of the wall took place between 1734 and 1736, however. During this time, a large portion of the military protections between the Friedrichswerder and Friedrichstadt neighborhoods was removed. The Friedrichstadt neighborhood was allowed to expand as far as the new fortified security wall. A large proportion of the new residents of the neighborhood were Huguenots, who continued to be persecuted for their beliefs in France.

By 1725, the neighborhood comprised 700 houses and counted 12,144 residents. In addition, the neighborhood was home to 85 taverns and 114 distilleries. The actual houses were usually two stories in height, built in the usual Baroque urban style of the day, but also with a harsh regularity. The houses were built with the long side, never the gable, toward the street. This was because the amount of assistance granted by the government for the construction of houses was based on the length of the front of the house. Because of this, the houses had large gardens in back. With the encouragement of the king, old and unsightly homes were torn down. However, other high authorities wished more homes to be built in the area, to accommodate soldiers and extra French Huguenot refugees, and lots for homes were given away. Along Koch Street, guild halls and tradesmens’ unions were constructed. The construction of a large manor in a neighborhood could give it a large boost, but the rejection or absence of such plans could result in economic disaster. Friedrichstadt fared favorably, when a French baron, Vernezobre de Laurieux, built a large palace on Wilhelm Street because of the marriage of his daughter to a local army captain.

The neighborhood contained two markets, the Mittelmarkt, now called the Gendarmenmarkt, and the Dönhoffplatz, which is located near the former fortress. Within the neighborhood, Leipzig Street, site of the Dönhoffplatz, and Frederick Street developed into the neighborhood’s main streets. Between 1725 and 1737 another 1,000 houses were built in the neighborhood. However, as the neighborhood grew, three other open areas remained at the edges of the neighborhood. As the construction of the neighborhood continued, the open areas became more and more important. The main director of construction in the neighborhood, Johann Philipp Gerlach, developed these open areas into important city plazas, and they were originally named the "Wilhelms-Markt," the "Achteck am Potsdamer Thor," and the "Rondell." The Wilhelms-Markt is so named because it is located on Wilhelm Street. The plaza is square, and planted with linden trees. Each corner of the square plaza contains a large marble statue of a famous Prussian general. The four generals honored in the plaza are Kurt Christoph Graf von Schwerin, Hans Karl von Winterfeldt, Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz, and Francis Edward James Keith. The Achteck am Potsadmer Thor was renamed the "Leipzigplatz" in 1814 for the Battle of Leipzig, and as its German names implies, the plaza has eight corners. The "Rondell" is a round plaza, and was subsequently renamed twice. It was renamed the "Belle-Alliance-Platz" in 1815 (named after "La Belle Alliance" and used as an alternative name for the Battle of Waterloo), and the "Mehringplatz," after Franz Mehring, in 1947.

The Gendarmenmarkt, Friedrichstadt's main plaza, experienced many changes toward the end of the 18th century. Between 1774 and 1776, a small French theater house was built, which was later christened the Nationaltheater as the establishment came to the forefront in German theater. Also, between 1780 and 1785, the French and German churches on the plaza built distinctive cupolaed towers on top of their churches, leading the to the two being known as the Deutscher Dom and the Französischer Dom (English: German and French Cathedrals, respectively) to the present day. In 1800, the Nationaltheater was replaced with a larger theater, the Schauspielhaus (English: Play House), whose architecture had to be designed to compete with the new cupola towers on the Gendarmenmarkt's twin churches. However, public reaction to the new theater's design was negative, and many people called the Carl Gotthard Langhans-designed building the "Koffer" (English: Trunk or suitcase). Luckily for dissatisfied Berliners, the Schauspielhaus burnt to the ground in 1817 and a new theater, designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel, was built in its place. In 1843, after 25 years of peace in Prussia, a monument to this achievement, the Friedenssäule (English: Peace Column) was built in the then Belle-Alliance-Platz.

The fortified walls which surrounded greater Berlin became a hindrance to traffic, which was becoming consistently busier and more uncontrolled. Although the walls had been constructed for the purposes of keeping invaders out, and stopping smuggling and deserters, the walls had become an increasing nuisance. Extra gates were deemed necessary. Another gate, the third for the Friedrichstadt neighborhood, was built in 1839, and opened in 1840.

The writer Max Osborn captures a picture of the economic development of Leipzig Street, and of Friedrichstadt as a whole during the 1870s in one of his memoirs:

:"The center of commercial life in Friedrichstadt was in its shops and offices, but these were somewhat sparse. Linden trees slowly filled the gaps between businesses which had been open for decades, before Leipzig Street had asserted its importance..."

:"Leipzig Street had a lot of potential, but when it just began, it differed greatly from our current perceptions of a great shopping street. There was no talk of the strings of closed and failed businesses which would occur; there were large gaps in the stores along the streets. However, even then the street was not defeated, its character remained. There were still many respectable middle-class families who lived comfortably in the upper stories of the buildings. In great numbers, they changed the pleasure gardens in the backs of the houses into vegetable gardens, and opened these to the public as inns and other such establishments, where one could sit under tall, old trees."

:"The neighborhood's traffic played out over the pavement in patterns we no longer know. Leipzig Street was not the only place people went in the neighborhood for shopping of piece of mind ... However, the conquest of Leipzig Street came in phases. While its eastern section was being besieged by the hordes of shoppers, its western sections remained calm."

Frederick Street, named after King Frederick I, the founder of Friedrichstadt, including the section in the Dorotheenstadt neighborhood, is 3.3 km (2.1 mi) length. It was the first the first shopping and amusement street in Berlin, and was a major artery in the road network. The street was so large that the royal army used it as a venue to practice marching, due to its length and width.

On the western side of the neighborhood, along the parallel-running Wilhelm Street, which was named after the crown prince, later king Frederick William, many government offices were constructed, and many government employees lived nearby. In 1896 on the Leipziger Platz, the Wertheim department store was built. It was at the time the largest department store in Europe. Although the store was destroyed in World War II, until this day its size has only been exceeded by Harrods in London.

Friedrichstadt was severely damaged in the widespread destruction which accompanied World War II. Many of the historic buildings in the neighborhood were so badly damaged that they had to be condemned or torn down. The construction of the Berlin Wall directly through the neighborhood brought only more destruction. In the northern portion of the neighborhood, which lay within the boundaries of Mitte Borough, which was part of East Berlin, systematic rebuilding began in 1970. Along Leipzig Street, which had been almost completely flattened, high-rise apartment buildings were constructed. In the southern half of Friedrichstadt, which was located in the West Berlin borough of Kreuzberg, a more historically accurate reconstruction of the neighborhood occurred. The neighborhood was reconstructed, block by block, according to the original street plan, in a historically accurate manner.

After the German reunification, a more comprehensive reconstruction effort was made in the neighborhood, with the goal of restoring the neighborhood to its former prominence. Many new and luxurious buildings were built with attention to historical styles. Many new businesses, including several high-end department stores and shops opened in the neighborhood. Gradually the Friedrichstadt neighborhood is restoring its famous pre-war charm.

Points of Interest

The Gendarmenmarkt is considered to be among the most beautiful plazas in all of Europe. In the middle of the plaza is a major theater, flanked by two important churches, the Deutscher and Französischer Dom (English: German and French cathedrals). Many new buildings have been constructed in the area as well. Due to the destruction from World War II, the oldest building on the Gendarmenmarkt is the former Bank of Prussia, built in 1901. Other buildings on the square have been carefully reconstructed. The German and French cathedrals were built from 1701 to 1708, and the cupolaed towers were added by each church at the same time, over 100 years later. Between these, the twice-destroyed Konzerthaus now seats 1,850.

Because Berlin is an independent city-state within Germany, Berlin has its own parliament at the state level. The parliament house of Berlin, the Berliner Abgeordnetenhaus, is located in Friedrichstadt, along Niederkirchner Street. The building has been in use since 1919, when the Prussian government used it. The neighborhood is also host to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a large and sometimes controversial monument located one block south of the Brandenburg Gate. It is located in the northwest corner of the neighborhood. Another famous landmark in Friedrichstadt is Checkpoint Charlie, the most infamous border crossing between East and West Berlin between 1945 and 1990.

Government buildings

Because of Friedrichstadt central location within Berlin, many government ministries and offices have their headquarters in the Friedrichstadt neighborhood. Although many ministries occupy older buildings, many are opting for newer, more modern headquarters, and new construction to accommodate these departments is not uncommon. Seven government ministries have their headquarters in the neighborhood, including the ministries of Finance, Scientific Research and Development, Family Services, Seniors', Women's, and Children's Services, Health, Justice, and Housing.

Many of the German federal states have their liaison offices to the federal government in Friedrichstadt as well, including the states of Bavaria, Brandenburg, Hamburg, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, Schleswig-Holstein, and Thuringia.

In addition to this, many foreign countries also have their embassies in the neighborhood. These countries are: Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Brunei, Canada, Chile, the Czech Republic, Greece, Ireland, Kenya, Libya, Morocco, Myanmar, New Zealand, North Korea, Portugal, Singapore, Slovenia, and South Africa.

In addition to all of this, one of Germany's major political parties, the Social Democratic Party, has its national headquarters at the southern end of the neighborhood.