Wehrhahnlinie

The ca­t­a­logue Wehrhahn Line is pub­lished by Ker­berver­lag to ac­com­pany the open­ing of the Wehrhahn-Linie Düs­sel­dorf in Fe­bruary 2016 as well as the ex­hi­bi­tion: “Cont­in­u­um and Cut – The Düs­sel­dorf Wehrhahn Line – A Syn­th­e­sis of the Arts”, April 30 – June 9, 2016 in Aedes Ar­chi­tec­ture Fo­rum, Ber­lin.
The Wehrhahn Line is a sub­way line in the very heart of Düs­sel­dorf that was de­vel­oped on the ba­sis of in­tense co­op­er­a­tion be­tween ar­chi­tects, artists, en­gi­neers and the mu­ni­ci­pal au­thor­i­ties from the very out­set. It is wide­ly rec­og­nized as con­sti­tut­ing a new mod­el for col­lab­o­ra­tive con­struc­tion. What was im­ple­ment­ed was a holis­tic con­cept by net­zw­erkar­chitek­ten and Heuke Kluss­man: A sub­way tun­nel as an “un­der­ground spa­tial cont­in­u­um” that writh­es like a giant snake through the earth, wi­den­ing at the sta­tions. The en­trances to the six new sta­tions are unique and spec­tac­u­lar­ly de­signed cuts in this Cont­in­u­um – pic­turesque, sculp­tu­ral, in­ter­ac­tive, acous­tic, in­ter­stel­lar and ge­o­met­ric in­ter­ven­tions that are inse­para­ble from the shell ge­ome­tries of the con­struc­tion.

“Düs­sel­dorf has pulled off a unique spa­tial ex­per­i­ment: Art and ar­chi­tec­ture set the tone for ur­ban and sub­ur­ban mo­bil­i­ty,” wrote Süd­deutsche Zei­tung

"What makes the de­sign of the Wehrhahn Line new, dar­ing, and pos­si­b­ly pi­oneer­ing is the holis­tic ap­po­rat­ed out from the out­set", com­ment­ed Frank­furter All­ge­meine Zei­tung

“The new metro rep­re­sents a rare mo­ment when peo­ple when­ev­er usu­al­ly in­ter­act – ci­ty bu­reau­crats, en­gi­neers, ar­chi­tects and artists – cre­ate some­thing big­ger than them­selves,” stat­ed The Guar­dian

And The New York Times head­lined: “Art and Mag­ic in a Ger­man Sub­way.”

An in­ter­dis­ci­pli­nary pro­ject by ar­chi­tects, en­ge­neers, artists, and the ci­ty of Düs­sel­dorf:
net­zw­erkar­chitek­ten, Heike Kluss­mann, Ralf Brög, Ur­su­la Damm, Manuel Franke, Enne Haehn­le, Tho­mas Strick­er

Text by
Ger­rit Goh­lke, Gre­gor Jansen, Ger­hard Matzig, Regine Müller, net­zw­erkar­chitek­ten, Sabine Maria Sch­midt, An­ja Schür­mann, Lud­wig Sey­farth, An­drea Sick, Hei­di Steck­er, Oliv­er Te­pel, Rob Wil­son

De­sign by
Mario Lom­bar­do und En­ver Hadz­i­jaj