News & Events
Workshop and Public Evening Event: “Back to history” or “city renewal”?
- Venue: im Nicolaihaus – ein Haus der Deutschen Stiftung Denkmalschutz, Brüderstraße 13, 10178 Berlin, Roter Salon, 1.OG
- Start: Wed, 27 Apr 2022 15:00:00 BST
- End: Thu, 21 Apr 2022 18:30:00 BST
Civil engagement for the historic city center since the 1980s
Over the past three decades, it has been widely discussed in Germany whether reconstructions of historical buildings and old town districts are timely, which buildings and layers of time are considered authentic and regarded as worth preserving, and how public urban spaces would be designed ideally. Debates about preservation and the recapturing of urban city centers are not new but rooted in endeavors for historic preservation since the mid 1970s as well as citizens’ initiatives for “cautious urban re-generation” of the 1980s in East and West Germany.
We want to take up these debates and discuss the motives underlying the rescue and preservation of historical building fabric in the 1980s and how the civic initiatives changed under the conditions of the 1990s and 2000s. What ideas of history were associated with the commitment to historical urban space, and what role does historic preservation play in this? To what extent was and still is the commitment to the “old town” political? And which role does the sense and politics of belonging play in these re-negotiations of urban identity?
Workshop and Public Event: “Back to history” or “city renewal”? - Programme
