Grand Hotel Esplanade
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Grand Hotel “Esplanade” once stood on Berlin’s busy transport and nightlife hub Potsdamer Platz. During its colourful and turbulent history it went from being one of the German capital’s most luxurious and celebrated hotels to a bombed-out ruin lost in the wastelands alongside the Berlin Wall. Miraculously it still survives today, albeit as a fragment incorporated into soaring modern complex, the Sony Center.
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[edit] Construction and design
The Hotel was built between 1907 and 1908 by the Fürstengruppe (Hohenlohe, Fürstenberg und Henckel von Donnersmarck) in accordance with the plans of Otto Rehnig, architect of the nearby and similarly fated Hotel Excelsior. When it opened in 1908 the construction cost an unprecedented 23 million Reichmarks. The architectural style, with its richly ornamented sandstone façade, was that of the Belle Epoque, and the interior palatial design incorporated elements from the Neo-Baroque and Neo-Rococo. The hotel accommodated numerous magnificent halls, amongst these was the Kaisersaal (the emperor’s hall). It was here that Kaiser Wilhelm II held an exclusive men’s evening. One of the most celebrated aspects of the hotel was a 1600 m² garden designed by garden architect Willi Wendt, which lay in the inner courtyard.
In the "Golden Twenties", the Esplanade became the scene of popular tea and dancing afternoons, which were regularly broadcast on the radio. Stars like Charlie Chaplin and Greta Garbo stayed here.
[edit] Destroyed and twice revived
In the winter of 1944/45 90% of the Esplanade was destroyed in bombing raids that crushed the once thriving hub of Potsdamer Platz. The sections that did manage to survive relatively unscathed were the Kaisersaal, the breakfast hall, the stairwell and the washrooms. After the war they were restored, together forming part of the original “Esplanade Hall Building”. The ceiling of the Palm Courtyard was restored and one of the other halls, the Silver Hall, was redesigned with its walls and ceiling decorated with silver and pillars adorned with abstract figures and patterns. And so, amidst what was then a rubble-strewn wilderness, the revived Esplanade became a hive of public activity once more. During the 1950s it was used variously as a restaurant and for fancy dress dances and carnival balls, and then later also for fashion shows.
However, in 1961 the Berlin Wall was erected only yards away, and the ruined hotel found itself in a no-mans land and a restricted area. As a consequence the lively programme of festivities was promptly curtailed.
Nevertheless, although now adrift from the rest of the city it was, with police permission, still accessible and so began a third lease of life as a popular set for films and television programmes. The interior can be seen in such international films as Caberet (1972) and Wings of Desire (1987) (see Trivia).
[edit] The preservation of historical monuments
After the fall of the wall in 1989 the remaining parts of the hotel was safe-guarded by the protection of historical monuments. Nevertheless when resurrection of Potsdamer Platz was underway and the first plans for the new Sony Center were drawn up, this factor was not considered; the Kaisersaal stood in the way and was therefore earmarked for demolition. In 1993 an ingenious idea was hatched. The Kaisersaal should be moved 75 metres (246 feet) and integrated into the Center inself. In 1996, with the aid of the most modern computer technology available, this is what happened. It was made possible with the most modern computer technology and a air-cushion construction. The costs for all this amounted to around 75 million marks. It was completed in March 1996. The likewise preserved Breakfast Hall was dismantled into 500 pieces and then later put back together again; this can be found today in Cafe Josty.
[edit] Trivia
Some interior scenes for the 1972 film Cabaret were shot here.
In Wim Wenders’ 1987 film Wings of Desire (Der Himmel Über Berlin) the bands Crime and the City Solution and Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds are shown playing in concert in the Kaisersaal.
