Program 17 - 19.10.2025

still in planning, details to follow

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Friday, 17.10.2025:
Vernissage and Opening

• 18.00 - 18:15: Greetings and brief introduction to the topic
• Opening of the special exhibition in the Infostation: "From design training to Nazi propaganda - the tenant magazines of EINFA and GEHAG 1930-1939": The exhibition is dedicated to the monthly tenant magazines published by EINFA from 1930-1939. This was part of the GEHAG housing association and reflects the upheavals in the politics of the company, which emerged from the left-wing political spectrum. Until mid-1933, the magazines primarily focused on house and garden, appropriate furnishings and healthy living. After GEHAG was brought into line, the layout changed first, and later the content as well, so that more and more Nazi propaganda found its way in.
• 19:30 / Evening program: Film screening(s) on the World Estates Estates
• Venue: Infostation Hufeisensiedlung, Fritz-Reuter-Allee 44, 12359 Berlin

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Saturday, 18.10.2025:
Guided tours, book presentation, keynote event

• 11.00 - 13.00: Architecture tours with different focuses and guides:
  Starting point: Hufeisensiedlung information station, Fritz-Reuter-Allee 44, 12359 Berlin. The tours last around one and a half to two hours and are dedicated to the topics of "Life in the World Heritage Site" as well as aspects of building, contemporary, social, cultural, urban and architectural history. If there is greater demand, thematically focused, target group-specific or English-language tours are also possible.
• 13.15 - 14.00: Curator-guided tours; at the end of the tours visit to the rentable museum TAUTES HEIM, with explanation by the operators Katrin Lesser and Ben Buschfeld
• 14.00 - 15.30: Book presentation TAUTES HEIM - Story & Details. with reading and discussions, details and participants for this part of the event will be announced. Registration is required. (The address will then be announced individually.) - Alternatively: Opportunity for self-organized snacks and/or a visit to the permanent and special exhibition in the Hufeisensiedlung information station.
• 16:00: Keynote lecture or talk on "100 years of Neues Bauen in Berlin" (local venue: possibly Hufeisensiedlung information station, Gutshof Britz or nearby - details, speakers and/or participants to be announced)
• Afterwards: get together
• Venues: Tautes Heim (address upon registration) and Hufeisensiedlung information station, additional lecture venue if necessary

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Sunday, 19.10.2025:
Public symposium

• 9.30 - 10.00 a.m.: Arrival at the conference venue:
  Kulturstall Britz - Schloß und Gutshof Britz, Alt-Britz 81-89, 12359 Berlin,
  Directions by public transport: Bus M46 to "Fulhamer Allee"
  or U7 to "Parchimer Allee" + 700 meters on foot.
• 10.00 - approx. 18.30: Symposium "100 years of the Hufeisensiedlung"
  The symposium is divided into different, approx. 1-hour thematic sections, each with 4-5 image and specialist presentations. Details and participants will follow:
  • Section I: Context and urban history
  • Section II: Stakeholders during the construction period
  • Section III: Rediscovery
  • Section IV: Life today
• There will be breaks and space for discussion during the program. The event is aimed at residents and the general public. Residents of similar ensembles are also very welcome. The conference venue is the Kulturstall on the grounds of the neighboring Britz estate
• A temporary exhibition on the six "Estates of Berlin Modernism" World Heritage sites will be shown in the foyer.

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On the subject

100 years of the Horseshoe Estate

Six "Estates of Berlin Modernism" were jointly declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008. This title means that they are considered to have "outstanding universal value for the history of mankind". Wow, but is it just simple housing? To answer this question, it helps to look at history and our own needs today. The six Estates were created in response to the housing shortage that was rampant in many European cities at the beginning of the 20th century. They established higher hygienic standards and new forms of relaxed urban development. Even today, these Estates are popular residential areas - and are rightly regarded as Berlin's most important contribution to architectural history. Many questions were not only asked here at the time, but also answered - questions that still concern us today, such as: "How do we want to live?", "What constitutes good living?", "What can architecture and urban planning contribute to this?", "How can better hygienic conditions be created?", "How can good neighbourliness be stimulated?", "How do I counter the constant threat of monotony in serial construction?" or "How can new, convincing concepts be implemented financially, organizationally and politically?"

Of these six UNESCO World Heritage-listed ensembles, the Horseshoe Estate is not only the largest, but also the most famous and the most challenging in terms of monument preservation. Even at the time of its construction, the large housing estate in Neukölln-Britz functioned as a divided "showplace". Two political camps and their respective sponsored housing associations, GEHAG and DEGEWO, competed here. Under the direction of Bruno Taut, the chief architect appointed by the GEHAG housing association, new forms of urban development were tested in the Hufeisensiedlung and components were developed that can be found in all kinds of parts of the city today. The urban development in Britz scaled the qualities of the garden city concept originating in England with simple terraced houses and lots of greenery and combined these with urban multi-storey housing, which could be built in series and in large numbers to save costs. 

The estate, grouped around the iconic 350-metre-long horseshoe row that gives it its name, is also an instructive mirror of the controversies and upheavals of later decades. Not only the discourse on urban development in the early 20th century can be traced here, but also the policy of conformity practiced by the Nazi state and the economic-liberal spirit of the late 1990s and its consequences.

Following the sale of GEHAG in 1998, the terraced houses with gardens that dominated the streetscape of the Hufeisensiedlung were converted into individual properties across the board. This massive challenge for the homogeneous preservation of the iconic and historic ensemble led to numerous initiatives, projects and publications that were initiated and developed by the residents. They have endured ever since and can thus also serve as examples for comparable complexes in terms of practiced participation, monument preservation and communication. They will also be reported on at the conference and during the tours.

Further information on world heritage and settlement

• Estates.de
• Estates.de/hufeisensiedlung
• Rentable museum TAUTES HEIM
• Café and exhibition at the Hufeisensiedlung information station

Organizer

Association of Friends and Sponsors of
Hufeisensiedlung Berlin-Britz (FFHBB e.V.)
c/o Infostation Hufeisensiedlung
Fritz-Reuter-Allee 44, 12359 Berlin

Curation and organization

Ben Buschfeld, buschfeld.com - graphic and interface design / Tautes Heim / Triennial der Modernism / FFHBB e.V. / IconicHouses / KulturerbeNetz.Berlin / Docomomo Germany / Deutscher Werkbund
buschfeld.com | tautes-heim.de | LinkedIn
Office +49 (0)30-25922963

Promoted by

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Further events

• 650-years-britz.info/

Aerial photo, 2014 (Photo: Ben Buschfeld)

Life in the settlement (private archive)

Privatization (Photo: Ben Buschfeld)

Café + exhibition (Photo: Katrin Lesser)

Bruno Taut's early work (public domain)

Tenant magazines 1930/33 (private archive)

Unesco World Heritage Site (Photo: Ben Buschfeld)

Rentable museum (Photo: Tautes Heim)

Construction phase I, end of 1925 (public domain)

Postcard, 1960s (private archive)

Foundation of the association (Photo: FFHBB)

Guided tour of the monument (Photo: Katrin Lesser)