A very special parliamentary building - the Bundestag in Berlin

When a large parliamentary building was required in Berlin, the Reichstag building was proposed and debated. The fights bet­ween Otto von Bis­marck and Reichstag mem­bers delayed construction so an architectural contest was held. The winner, Frank­furt arch­itect Paul Wallot, was asked to design a building in the Italian High Renaissance style that would feat­ure a very large dome. In June 1884 the foundation stone for the building was laid and ten years later, the build­ing was complete. Located on Platz der Republik, along the Spree River just north of Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag had four 40-meters-high towers.

After it opened in 1894, the Reichstag building housed the German Parl­iament. But in Feb 1933, the dome was ruined along with the rest of the building in a fire. Despite there being lit­tle evidence to blame anyone in particular, it was blamed on the Communists. The remains and the dome were further demolished with the bombings of Berlin through WW2 and the eventual liberation of Berlin by the Soviets in 1945.

With the new Constitution of 1949, the Bundestag was established as the new West German parliament in Bonn.

The Bundestag/Lower House decided to rebuild the Reichstag building in Berlin, this time without a dome; the original had been demolished in 1954 as structurally unsound. The decorative figures that had been dest­royed were not restored, and the façade was simplified. While the Reichstag was part­ially reconstructed in the 1960s as a conference centre, the dome was not. Renovations to the building were carried out according to plans by Paul Baumgarten and were completed in 1972.

The Reichstag in Berlin
transformed by Norman Foster from 1993

With the reunification of Germany and the decision to move the cap­ital from Bonn back to Berlin, it was decided that the old Reich­stag building should be re-built along with a new dome that emphas­ised a unified Germany. The transparent design of the Reichstag dome was intended to symbolise Berlin's attempt to move away from a past of Nazism and turn instead towards a united, democratic Germany. 

The Reichstag in Berlin was the site of German reunification cerem­onies in Oct 1990. British architect Sir Norman Foster was commis­s­ioned in 1992 to trans­form the renovated C19th building into the new home of a unified German Parliament. Foster began to rebuild the Reichstag in 1993, focusing on the glass dome that was constructed on top. The distinct­ive app­earance of the new dome, which derives from a 1988 design by Gott­fried Böhm, has made it a prominent landmark in Berlin.

Foster’s Reichstag was deliberately intended to be viewed from above. His brilliant gleaming glass and metal dome directly overlooked the debating chamber for the Bunde­stag, all­ow­ing the German people to watch their Govern­ment’s Parliamentary proceedings down below. Citizens were now democ­ratic and "above government", as opposed to how German society had existed under National Social­ism.

 

Inside the glass dome

Note the inverted cone of mirrors in the mid­dle, and the spiralling ramps.

The Bundestag today, flooded with natural light
In the absence of the 709 Parliamentarians, guides can take tourists around the building.

The dome is open to the public and the roof terrace above can be reached by climbing two steel, spiralling, double-helix-type ramps. The dome thus works as a viewing platform with clear panels, from which the public could view the entire city. In fact the 360° view of the surrounding Berlin cityscape includes both East and West.

The glass dome was specifically designed by Foster to be environ­ment­ally friendly. He wrote that the cupola is both a generative element in the internal workings of the building and a key component in our light & energy saving strategies. It communicates the themes of lightness, transparency, permeability and public access that underscore the project.

A skylight, with a significant inverted cone of mirrors in the mid­dle of the opening of the dome, directs sun­light into the building and draws light into the plenary chamber. A large sun shield tracks the movement of the sun electr­on­ically and blocks direct sunlight, thus effectively decreasing the carbon emis­sions of the building.

Foster was awarded the Pritzker Prize in 1999 for his work on the building, which has become one of the top tourist destinations in Berlin. It is known for sleek, mod­ern designs of steel and glass, an innovative archit­ectural dome design that was described as a sculpture of light.

Käfer Dachgarten Restaurant

The architect’s final task was to design a restaurant that is pub­licly accessible all year round in the national parliament build­ing. The exterior of this rooftop restaurant is a big box, placed on the Reichstag’s eastern wing next to the crowning glass dome. And the restaurant’s interior is simple. But the views east across the German capital are amazing and the food is rich and very inter­esting eg the beer-and-sausage Bavarian breakfast. Reservations and security checks are essential! Is the German Bundestag the only parliament building in the world to include a fine public restaurant?

The German Bundesrat is the Upper House legislative body that represents the sixteen federated states of Germany at the national level. The Bundesrat meets in a separate Berlin building.