BERLIN — One day in 2002, the architect Christoph Roedig and his partner in business and life Uli Schop were biking through what was then an ungentrified corner of Berlin’s Mitte neighborhood, on a street not far from where the Berlin Wall once divided the city. World War II-era bombings had knocked down 19th- and early-20th-century housing developments in that part of the former East Germany. Though the former East German government had cleared away the rubble, they had never rebuilt. That day the couple came upon a plot and hatched a plan. They were determined to find a project that would become a showpiece for their newly formed architecture firm and they needed a place to live. They also knew that many of their friends, almost all, at the time, in their 30s, were searching for homes. Mr. Roedig, now 45, and Mr. Schop, 46, gathered a group of nearly 10 potential buyers to discuss creating a co-op building. The plot’s price — 250,000 euros, or about $360,000, at the time — put the project within reach. The idea was 10 apartments, designed and built to each buyer’s specification, with communal areas and shared costs.
Mr. Roedig recalls plying the prospective buyers with questions. “We asked them ‘How do you imagine living? What are your plans for the future? Is there going to be a child that will move in to your place? Or moves out? Or a mother that will move in?’ So we dealt with all these concepts then we made a scheme for the whole house.” Some wanted lofts, some wanted rooms, he said. Then he added, laughing, “For ourselves we didn’t know what we wanted.”
Construction began in 2004 and was completed a year later for an additional 850,000 euros, or just over $1.1 million, a fee shared between all the owners.
The result is an elegant, six-story apartment house with 10 units. The light gray structure is sheathed in fiber concrete, a material that impressed Mr. Roedig. “It is very light and strong,” he said, “When the sun is shining on it and it is very reflective and glossy and shiny. But when it’s wet it is a bit darker.” The couple’s duplex apartment is on the first floor; it is made up of what would have been two apartments. The long rectangular apartment has the look and feel of a loft, with its polished concrete walls and open plan layout.
The entrance to their home is in the rear of the building. Mr. Schop and Mr. Roedig have a wood planked deck, set with white Ron Arad chairs and a table, that overlooks the building’s large communal garden planted with peppermint, herbs and flowers.
Just inside the couple’s home, past floor-to-ceiling windows and a glass door, is a dining area with a large, simple, smoked-oak, table built by a carpenter friend who created much of the couple’s furniture.
“We had an idea of an old Bruegel-like table where people really sit and get old,” Mr. Roedig said. Surrounding the table are white plastic Bontempi Casa Spider stacking chairs. An oak, cube-shaped, banquette for storage, also built by their carpenter friend, runs the entire length of the apartment.
Past the dining area are the kitchen and bathroom, which make up the central space on the first floor. The kitchen and bathroom are on either side of a floor-to-ceiling partition made of thick concrete. The kitchen, painted lime green, is nestled in the shadow of a steel staircase. The staircase, with no railing, seems suspended as if in a Magritte painting: It is because the steps are bolted into the wall, and only air is between each rung.
In another quirky design element, the kitchen has no handles because Mr. Roedig has a disdain for such things. Instead, each drawer and cabinet opens with a light push. On the other side of the room divider is the bathroom; here instead of no handles, there are no doors visible. Hidden sliding doors are tucked into wall pockets and slide out when privacy is needed. The bathroom walls are playfully lined in colorful ceramic tile in homage to a mod color-blocked Ellsworth Kelly painting that hangs in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Just beyond the kitchen and bath is a spartan sitting area, with a slender couch and two matching wood wing chairs picked up from the home of Mr. Schop’s parents.
Upstairs is a large and airy open space with concrete floors that contain a living area, bathroom, walk-in boudoir and bedroom. Enormous windows on this level can open 180 degrees, turning the living area into what Mr. Roedig describes as a “balcony room.” The center of this space is also divided by a concrete partition. One side has a bathroom, and the other is an immense armoire, lit with antique light fixtures purchased by the couple in an Amsterdam antique shop. The same carpenter who designed the dining room table and the banquette downstairs also built the couple’s whitened oak platform bed, in the bedroom area just beyond.
Mr. Roedig and Mr. Schop point out that they live in the building, not just their own apartment. The building was designed to be a kind of modern-day kibbutz.
Four communal spaces are shared between the tenants, including a spacious roof deck, the setting of multiple parties a year, and a top-floor garret apartment with a commanding Berlin city view. All of the owners coveted the top floor apartment, arguing over it. But they immediately came to agreement when the idea of a communal garret for guests was floated by the architects. Each apartment rotates the ownership of that small flat, switching every Wednesday. If Mr. Schop and Mr. Roedig do not have guests, Mr. Roedig said he will sometimes just move upstairs and sleep there for a few days.
“I always had a dream of communal living,” Mr. Roedig said. “I think I would really have a problem now moving into a normal house. Here you can ring any doorbell. You always feel very secure.”
Mr. Roedig recalls plying the prospective buyers with questions. “We asked them ‘How do you imagine living? What are your plans for the future? Is there going to be a child that will move in to your place? Or moves out? Or a mother that will move in?’ So we dealt with all these concepts then we made a scheme for the whole house.” Some wanted lofts, some wanted rooms, he said. Then he added, laughing, “For ourselves we didn’t know what we wanted.”
Construction began in 2004 and was completed a year later for an additional 850,000 euros, or just over $1.1 million, a fee shared between all the owners.
The result is an elegant, six-story apartment house with 10 units. The light gray structure is sheathed in fiber concrete, a material that impressed Mr. Roedig. “It is very light and strong,” he said, “When the sun is shining on it and it is very reflective and glossy and shiny. But when it’s wet it is a bit darker.” The couple’s duplex apartment is on the first floor; it is made up of what would have been two apartments. The long rectangular apartment has the look and feel of a loft, with its polished concrete walls and open plan layout.
The entrance to their home is in the rear of the building. Mr. Schop and Mr. Roedig have a wood planked deck, set with white Ron Arad chairs and a table, that overlooks the building’s large communal garden planted with peppermint, herbs and flowers.
Just inside the couple’s home, past floor-to-ceiling windows and a glass door, is a dining area with a large, simple, smoked-oak, table built by a carpenter friend who created much of the couple’s furniture.
“We had an idea of an old Bruegel-like table where people really sit and get old,” Mr. Roedig said. Surrounding the table are white plastic Bontempi Casa Spider stacking chairs. An oak, cube-shaped, banquette for storage, also built by their carpenter friend, runs the entire length of the apartment.
Past the dining area are the kitchen and bathroom, which make up the central space on the first floor. The kitchen and bathroom are on either side of a floor-to-ceiling partition made of thick concrete. The kitchen, painted lime green, is nestled in the shadow of a steel staircase. The staircase, with no railing, seems suspended as if in a Magritte painting: It is because the steps are bolted into the wall, and only air is between each rung.
In another quirky design element, the kitchen has no handles because Mr. Roedig has a disdain for such things. Instead, each drawer and cabinet opens with a light push. On the other side of the room divider is the bathroom; here instead of no handles, there are no doors visible. Hidden sliding doors are tucked into wall pockets and slide out when privacy is needed. The bathroom walls are playfully lined in colorful ceramic tile in homage to a mod color-blocked Ellsworth Kelly painting that hangs in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Just beyond the kitchen and bath is a spartan sitting area, with a slender couch and two matching wood wing chairs picked up from the home of Mr. Schop’s parents.
Upstairs is a large and airy open space with concrete floors that contain a living area, bathroom, walk-in boudoir and bedroom. Enormous windows on this level can open 180 degrees, turning the living area into what Mr. Roedig describes as a “balcony room.” The center of this space is also divided by a concrete partition. One side has a bathroom, and the other is an immense armoire, lit with antique light fixtures purchased by the couple in an Amsterdam antique shop. The same carpenter who designed the dining room table and the banquette downstairs also built the couple’s whitened oak platform bed, in the bedroom area just beyond.
Mr. Roedig and Mr. Schop point out that they live in the building, not just their own apartment. The building was designed to be a kind of modern-day kibbutz.
Four communal spaces are shared between the tenants, including a spacious roof deck, the setting of multiple parties a year, and a top-floor garret apartment with a commanding Berlin city view. All of the owners coveted the top floor apartment, arguing over it. But they immediately came to agreement when the idea of a communal garret for guests was floated by the architects. Each apartment rotates the ownership of that small flat, switching every Wednesday. If Mr. Schop and Mr. Roedig do not have guests, Mr. Roedig said he will sometimes just move upstairs and sleep there for a few days.
“I always had a dream of communal living,” Mr. Roedig said. “I think I would really have a problem now moving into a normal house. Here you can ring any doorbell. You always feel very secure.”
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