[Berlin] The Berliner Philharmonie by Hans Sharoun – written by Serena Cerillo

Hi guys,

this time I won’t be the author of the article. I’ve rather asked Serena Cerillo, one of my closest friends, to write a post about the Berliner Philharmonie, in order to complete the series of the concert halls.

Here is the article! Enjoy!

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I clearly remember the first time I’ve been to the Philharmonie. It was a sunny winter day during my Erasmus exchange time and we were involved in several architectural tours of the city at that time.

They offer an interesting guided tour, which you can still enjoy daily at 1.30 p.m (except in July, August and few festive days in December).

While leaving our coats at the cloakroom, I was with my nose up already, trying to understand that unusual space with articulated overlapping floors. The white simplicity of the plaster clearly contrasts and highlights the colorful dots of the windows: combined shades of yellow, green, blue, or purple red and orange are following you while silently escalating up to the galleries. I remember stopping in one of the recording room to observe the beauty of the sun gently playing with those windows.

 

The second entrance

The detail of the colorful windows

Once you get to your floor and section, you’ll be highly surprised while passing through the wooden door: from a white, pure, functional, but well-designed external core, you are suddenly thrown into a huge warm prospectively articulated space. My first feeling was the lack of balance. Especially if the space is observed from one of the top side galleries, you can feel on the top of a labyrinth and you are not sure anymore to which gravitational axis your feet are referring to the one of your floor: the one of the gallery below or the central stage one.

The inner concert hall from above

The inner concert hall from above

Hans Scharoun designed the pentagonal space of the hall (back in 1960) on several staggered rising levels, in order to allow each viewer, or in this case “hearer”, to enjoy the music in the same way. For the same reason, he placed the stage in the middle of the hall. This innovative seat arrangement got its own new typology definition, the so-called “vineyard-style”, that has inspired later concert halls like the Sidney Opera House and Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg (see articles here and here).

During my first concert there, I remember my sight getting lost through the floating acoustic panels of the ceiling, that create a silent cloud on the articulated landscape.

Written by Serena Cerillo

During the concert

During the concert

The building at night