Beautiful as Nefertiti - Dreßler Bau · Beautiful as Nefertiti Five museums make up the Museum Island in Berlin: the Bode Museum, the Old National Gallery, the Pergamon Museum, the

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Beautiful as Nefertiti

Five museums make up the Museum Island in Berlin:the Bode Museum, the Old National Gallery, thePergamon Museum, the Old Museum and the NewMuseum. Together they represent a unique ensemble,which has been adopted into the UNESCO WorldHeritage List. A master plan was decided upon in 1999for the renovation of the buildings and thecontemporary development of the entire museumquarter, and was also part of the application for thetitle ‘World Cultural Heritage Site’. It recognises theensemble of five historic buildings as a unit in termsof content, but respects their architectural autonomy.The implementation of the idea of the masterplan hasbeen taken over by the Museum Island planninggroup, which is made up of the architectural con -sultancies commissioned with the renovation of the

Architectural concrete precast elements for the New Museum in BerlinShe will captivate museum visitors in Berlin once again from Autumn 2009:Nefertiti, the beautiful wife of the Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaton is returningto the Museum Island. It will then be possible to see her in the rebuilt NewMuseum. Under the guiding theme ‘cautious further building’, no 1:1reconstruction of the historic building has been carried out, nor has therebeen any intervention of modernity in the listed building fabric. The speci -fied structure and cubature of the Stüler building was implemented in theclear language of forms of David Chipperfield whilst preserving the originalfabric, and was developed for contemporary and future-orientated use ofthe museum by the Egyptian Museum and the Museum of Prehistory andEarly History. An impressive rebuilding with ambitious extensions in highquality marble concrete.

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Sketch by David Chipperfield

Façade with rebuilt north-west wing

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individual buildings under the leadership of DavidChipperfield Architects. Over 6000 years of humanhistory are presented in a temple city of art and cultureon an island in the Spree with an area of almost 1square kilometre.

New Museum

The New Museum was built between 1841 and 1859in accordance with plans by the architect Friedrich-August Stüler. During the Second World War, the mainstaircase was badly damaged in November 1943 andthe north-west wing and the south-east projection werecompletely destroyed in February 1945.First securing and protective measures were taken inthe 1980s, but it wasn’t until the reunification ofGermany that the New Museum was given a genuinelynew perspective. The exciting task was to redesign

well-preserved rooms, derelict parts of the buildingand completely missing areas. The rebuilding strategywas: the history of the building should not bedisclaimed and the whole thing should be put in order

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Main staircase with new stairs made of high quality architectural concrete

Main staircase before and after the destruction in the Second World War


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whilst at the same time emphasising the history. Theintense discussions on the type and scope of therebuilding of the New Museum lasted over ten yearsbefore the English architect David Chipperfield wasthen commissioned with the project. Measures were to be taken in accordance with thepremise of the preservation of historic buildings:'Conservation instead of restoration, retention insteadof rebuilding'. New elements were integrated wherebuilding fabric no longer existed. Architecturalconcrete with ground and sand-blasted surfaces waschiefly used here as a building material for ceilings,walls and floor coverings.

Hence, the stairs of the main staircase and the interiorsof the rooms in the two building wings wereconstructed with modern precast elements made ofarchitectural concrete. The architectural challenge layon the one hand in redesigning the missing parts of theNew Museum building in terms of form and material,and on the other in satisfying the demands of a modernmuseum building with regard to building serviceengineering, fire prevention and infrastructure. Thecompletely destroyed north-west wing with theEgyptian Courtyard and the south-east projection werere-erected. The exterior walls were rebuilt with oldbricks.

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Floor plan – level 0

EgyptianCourtyard

Greek Courtyard

Ground hand rail in the main staircase


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High quality precast elements

Absolutely sharp edges, the highest possibleuniformity of the surface in terms of colour, roughnessand structure, the exact fit of the new concreteelements both to one another and to the old structures,with an accuracy of the order of millimetres – thesewere the clear demands placed on the architecturalconcrete precast elements. The order for theirmanufacture was placed with the Dressler Bau GmbHprecast works in Aschaffenburg in spring 2005. It wasonly possible to satisfy the extremely high demands onthe manufacture thanks to special preliminary work onthe part of the architects: precise measurements of theexisting structures and unitisation down to the finestdetail. The partnership-like cooperation between thearchitects, the technical office and the concretelaboratory at the precast factory in implementing thespecifications for the structural element thicknesses,fastenings, detail connections and concrete technologywere the basic preconditions for the success of thisambitious project. With an enormous amount of efforton both the planning and production sides, the limitsof what is possible were reached here. To emphasiseone particular point here: a size of 5 mm wascontractually specified for both the horizontal andvertical joints; the permissible tolerances of the jointswere agreed at +/- 1 mm. Of course, such a specifica -tion cannot be realised with the usual measures inprecast construction. Specially calibrated tapemeasures and folding rulers were therefore necessaryfor both the manufacture and assembly. The manufacturers Dressler Bau additionally set up aquality assurance system in order to ensure com -pliance with the specifications for the manufacture of

the precast elements, especially for the appearance andthe tolerances. To this end, appropriate instrumentationwas developed for each individual precast element inorder to ensure the high quality standards, from theconstruction of the formwork and the concretingprocess through to the storage and transport. By meansof a ‘precast element pass’ for each element, it waspossible to fulfil the builder’s demands that verifica tion

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Treatment of the flight of stairs with a diamond drilling miller

Detailed view of the ground hand rail

Lifting a precast element through the open temporary protective roof


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of compliance with the tolerances be provided beforedelivery and assembly. This high expenditure for thequality verification ensured that only parts that fit weretransported to the building site. Standstill times duringassembly were avoided as a result.Closed transport vehicles were used for the most partin order to avoid the elements becoming dirty duringtransport from the precast factory to Berlin. Great carewas also called for in securing the individual highvalue concrete elements for transport. Assembly wasmainly performed by tower cranes, whereby thevariable protective roof in the area of the existingbuilding had to be opened for each individual liftingoperation. In the basement, the precast elements werebrought to the place of installation by means ofelaborate transfer inside the building. Extensivemeasures were taken to protect the concrete surfaces,which were actually the final surfaces even in the rawbuilding state, such as rear-ventilated wooden form -work or galvanised connecting reinforcements.A total of 8,200 precast elements were assembled, thelast of them in August 2008. The heaviest precastelement weighs 21 tonnes. Most of the precastelements are unica in terms of their geometry.

Marble concrete

A high quality building substancewas developed with marble fromopen-cast mines in the OreMountains. Many attempts werenecessary in order to create arigid concrete with this specialaggregate which, with its highrigidity, guarantees the requiredevenness of the concrete surface.Only the limits of pourability andflowability forced the addition ofappropriate quantities of waterand liquefier. The followingingredients are to be found in theconcrete composition: marbleaggregate, white cement, sand,

water and liquefier. Each cubic metre of concretecontains 1,300 kg of marble aggregate with a graindiameter from 2 to 35 mm. In total, 1,950 m³ of marble concrete were manu -factured, 5,300 m² of concrete surface were groundand 11,250 m² sand-blasted. Particularly worthy of amention are the columns of up to 15 m in length with asquare cross-section and an edge length of 50 cm,which were blasted on all four sides, and the handrailsof the stairs, which were ground to a round form usinga diamond form miller.

In addition there were numerous joists, ceiling slabs,door reveals, columns, floor coverings, steps and wallpanels with individual element sizes of up to 8 x 3 m,which were also ground and sand-blasted.

Main staircase

The main staircase of the New Museum stood withouta protective roof until 1986. In accordance with DavidChipperfield’s design for the rebuilding, these 22metre high masonry walls remain 60 years after theend of the war as they are, marked by war and thedivision of Germany, and assume only the function ofthe main staircase. The original dimensions of theroom are retained. From the formerly richly decoratedwalls, only the masonry will remain visible. The newstairs integrated in this room are made up entirely ofmarble concrete precast elements, with both groundand sand-blasted surfaces. Alongside special indivi dual

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View of the precast platform in the Egyptian Courtyard from below

Interior view of the apse in the Greek Courtyard

Concrete aggregates: (1) white cement, (2) marble 2/8, (3) marble 8/16, (4) marble

16/35, (5) quartz sand 0/1, (6) sand 0/2


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rooms and the Greek Courtyard, it is mainly theEgyptian Courtyard and the main staircase thatrepresent the highlight of the capabilities of archi -tectural concrete.

Inner courtyards

Of the two inner courtyards, the Greek Courtyard wasvery well preserved, apart from the destroyed apse. Inthe lower wall area, a new sand-blasted wall of marbleconcrete was placed in front all round. The apse wasbuilt up again in the upper area using old bricks. Theso-called Egyptian Courtyard in particular has beengiven a new interiority through the use of architecturalconcrete elements. Contrary to the condition before thedestruction, new exhibition rooms were added on threefloors, supported by a system of columns and coveredby a glass roof. The design envisaged four-sided, sand-blasted, 15 metre high 50/50 columns for this supportsystem. At the same time, the intersections of theprecast element construction had to be formed in sucha way that the observer does not perceive the indivi -dual elements and assumes a continuous, monolithicnode. All visible concrete surfaces are sandblastedhere also.For their manufacturing, the columns were concretedin a recumbent position with a cross-section of 55/50.Following the initial curing process, five centimetreswere removed from the pouring side in order to

achieve the final cross-section of 50 x 50 cm. The highrigidity of the concrete was decisive for this. Thanks tothis unusual method it was possible to give all sides ofthe columns a similar appearance by means of four-sided sand-blasting.

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Laying the floor slabs in the Greek Courtyard with its distinctive apse

Precast columns with grating on the glass roof level of the Egyptian Courtyard


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Rolling ceilings

Due to the destruction in the Second World War, therewere no ceilings in the wing areas. Hence, the buildingservice engineering systems required for a modernmuseum and the associated routing of cables and pipescould be freely designed. Since the intention was toprovide an intermediate space for the building service

engineering systems in addition to a sand-blastedsuspended ceiling and to construct the supporting cast-in-situ ceiling above that, the 'rolling ceiling' wasinvented as a solution. To this end, the supportingjoists were mounted first, sand-blasted, in the lowervisible area. The self-supporting suspended ceilingelements, made of marble concrete, were subsequently

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Corner intersection of the precast construction in the Egyptian Courtyard

Rolling ceiling in the assembled condition without upper ceiling and with still open intermediate spaces


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placed at distances on the console of the joists. Theseceiling slabs are provided with rollers at the supportpoints and can thus be slid easily. Finally, precast slabswere placed on the joists and the supporting ceilingconcrete was poured. In order to install the buildingservice engineering systems, the suspended ceilingelements were simply pushed together and separatedagain after installation was complete. The lightingunits are situated between the ceiling slabs. Theremaining intermediate space is either filled with twocentimetre thick sand-blasted concrete slabs or servesas an empty space for the installation of lighting unitsand other built-in technical equipment.

Intermediate space between the suspended ceiling and the supporting storey ceiling

Finished rolling ceiling with built-in lighting units and ‘carrot columns’

Rolling mechanism for the suspended ceiling


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Prospects

Nefertiti can look forward to moving back into amodern New Museum in autumn 2009. With couragefor the new and a great deal of esteem for the old,everyone involved in the project has succeeded increating a symbiosis of old and new. Alongside theunique exhibits, the visitors will experience anoutstanding museum building.

Dipl.-Ing. Tobias Mann

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Symbiosis of decay and revival – impressions of the rebuilding of the New Museum

David Chipperfield ArchitectsLondon/Berlinwww.davidchipperfield.com

Dreßler Bau GmbHAschaffenburg, Germanywww.dressler-bau.de


Beautiful as Nefertiti - Dreßler Bau · Beautiful as Nefertiti Five museums make up the Museum Island in Berlin: the Bode Museum, the Old National Gallery, the Pergamon Museum, the

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