Present:
Germany Brings Flowers to The Future
Germany Brings Flowers to The Future
Social responsibility comes in many guises, but in Germany, they sometimes say it with flowers. In 2005, the biennial National Garden Festival held in Munich (Bundesgartenschau Munchen, German acronym: BUGA), provided a colorful cover for the recycling of a redundant airport and a blighted neighborhood. But cleaning up was not the end in itself: basic to the new area was the relocation of the International Trade Fair Center, a vital part of the city's economic future.
If the festival theme "Change of Perspective" (Perspektivenwechsel) stated the hopes for the east side of the capital of Bavaria, it also had an environmental double meaning. Not only would exhibitions and art installations introduce new ways of thinking about tomorrow, but the 73 hectares set aside for the landscape park it created would go beyond conventional urban planning. From the outset it was designed to provide the district with cleaner, cooler air as well as greenery and playing fields.
Since the first National Garden Festival in 1951, these federally blessed projects have been more than showcases for innovation in horticulture and ecology. In the beginning they cleared rubble and turned bombed-out sites into livable spaces. With the unification of Germany, long-neglected parks in the former Soviet zone were restored. There was cultural achievement too. Kassel's major international art exhibition "Documenta" had its inception at the 1955 Garden Festival.
Munich's project began a full decade in advance. Following a design competition won by Paris architect Gilles Vexlard in 1996, the city entered a successful bid for the 2005 National Garden Festival. German architects, artists and landscape designers were assembled, and planning was followed by planting. In went 30,000 trees, quickly followed by 10,000 shrubs and approximately two million flower bulbs. Massive conceptions of outdoor art moved from drawing board to realization.
By the time the gates opened in late April 2005, an ugly and dangerous space was a mammoth garden complete with pavilions that used recirculated rainwater for their inside fountains and a 35-acre lake complete with an inviting beach, lakeside walk and adjacent playgrounds. There was a soccer field (subtly advertising the World Cup to be held in Germany in 2006) and a halfpipe where the Munich city skateboard championship will be held. Reggae and Hip-hop music for the young balanced the oom-pah of classic Bavarian bands beloved by their elders.
The 130 hectares (approx. 321.24 acres) of central exhibit area included meaningful, if temporary, installations of art within the context of permanent landscaping. In a dozen 6.6-hectare Cell Gardens, the "Perspectives" were turned upside down: visitors could experience the natural world as indigenous creatures---bugs, mice, birds and the like---as they moved among 12 spaces or "cells" connected by walkways and footbridges. One of the most popular cells was an enormous birds' nest where the message was a return to Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring." The huge pattern of a leaf seen from a raised walkway (or, better yet, from a cable car) was the leaf's underside, literally a bug's eye view.
To be sure, the leap to understanding the fragility of the natural world was often greeted with polite disinterest by the average visitor.
"People say "we are missing the flowers," spokesperson Max-Joseph Kronnenbitter said. "But we have the same number. The area is just larger." The area will include new housing as well as shops and support businesses.
But in the summer of 2005, home gardeners inspected fragrant wallflowers and variegated tulips. Prize-winning orchids filled the pavilion in May; mums in September. The rose garden was a predictable hit. The kitchen garden had the latest varieties of vegetables. The wildflower carpet was greeted with cries of approval. The cemetery plantings and monuments had people taking notes.
All the necessities for successful fair were in place from beer gardens to a succession of events that included the International Puppet Festival and a performance of "The Magic Flute." Bicycle riders and walkers took immediately to the perimeter path, and there was easy access to the site by public transportation as well as road. By subway, the new district is only 12 minutes from the center of Munich.
Munich-Riem had been destroyed in World War II; rebuilt then found inadequate to handle the volume of air traffic in the 1980s. By the time the new airport at Erding opened in 1992, plans were underway to use the old site as part of a total renewal for the wretched neighborhood on Munich's east side. New housing was not enough. Purposeful business and employment opportunities were vital.
Solution? Do a thorough environmental compatibility test then rebuild the district. It would be called "Messestadt-Riem," and it was divided into one-third International Trade Fair Centre (Messestadt) and commercial; one-third residential and one-third green space. Officially opened but still a work in progress, Messe Munchen International (MMI) is both multi-functional and one of the world's most technologically advanced trade fair sites. It is, at present, the only exhibition center in the world capable of producing its own electricity from solar energy.
It may also be the only one that flowered in a garden.
German National Tourist Office
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