Die Abrissfrage

In response to the current climate, biodiversity, and energy crises, critiques of current demolition practices have become more vocal. In Germany, an estimated 50,000 buildings are torn down annually. Die Abrissfrage (The Demolition Question) sheds light on the phenomenon of demolition in the building sector from various perspectives. Approaches drawn from the fields of architectural history and theory, historic preservation, feminism, activism, and art are employed in order to analyze the ecological, political, socioeconomic, and cultural consequences of practices of demolition and rebuilding that remain grounded in the logic of modernism. The contributions investigate the historical development of demolition practices, along with the ideological influences that shape them, the current network of protagonists, and related gentrification processes, but also the anti-demolition movement that began to form in the 1960s.

This volume appears in the framework of a new publication series that addresses current questions related to environmental and socially responsible building. Considered as well are major twentieth-century pioneers of ecological building. The editors of the series are Philipp Oswalt and Alexander Stumm.

With contributions by ANA, Elisabeth Broermann, Laura Calbet, Dina Dorothea Falbe, Maximilian Hartinger, Maria Hudl, Katrine Majlund Jensen, Adrian Nägel, Yulia Ostheimer, Luise Rellensmann, Tim Rieniets, Martha Seeger, Lukas Strasser and Alexander Stumm, as well as the architecture collectives AbbrechenAbbrechen (Munich), Abrisskollektiv (Hannover), Initiative Perspektive Europaviertel (Freiburg), and ufoufo (Berlin)

• Examines the current state of debates concerning demolition, along with arguments and statistics
• Wide-ranging research and documentation on recently demolished or currently threatened buildings
• Highlights the history and networking of the anti-demolition movement in Germany beginning in the 1960s

Luise Rellensmann is a professor for architectural upgrades, monuments conservation, and building surveying at the University of Applied Sciences in Munich. With her research on “Monuments Preservation without Conservators” and on garages in the GDR, she interrogates conventional conceptions of historic preservation, calling for a critical and transformative preservation and architectural practices.