100th Birthday of Hardt-Waltherr Hämer

Hardt-Waltherr (known as Gustav) Hämer was an architect, urban planner and, last but not least, vice-president of the Akademie der Künste from 1989 to 1997 at a time when the existence of the Akademie was under threat. Together with Walter Jens and Heiner Müller, he contemplated a sustainable European artists’ association during the phase when the two Berlin academies were being unified.

Born in Hagen near Lüneburg in 1922, he studied architecture in Berlin until 1952 and worked as a freelance architect (including at Theater Ingolstadt). After 1968, he initiated pilot projects for the renovation of old buildings in Berlin; after 1979, Hämer was planning director for urban renewal during the IBA (1984–1987) in Berlin (West) and was managing director of S.T.E.R.N. GmbH from 1986. In the last years of his life, he campaigned for the preservation and redevelopment of the Studentendorf Schlachtensee designed by Fehling, Gogel, Pfankuch and redeveloped his first work, the Schifferkirche in Ahrenshoop (1951). The commemorative event will focus on Hämer as a teacher, architect, urban renewer and homo politico in four panel discussions, with space for personal reminiscences in between.

Cooperation: Studentendorf Schlachtensee, Deutscher Werkbund Berlin, S.T.E.R.N. – Stiftung soziale Stadtentwicklung