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In Berlin, meticulous sitework and off-site production help piece together a sober memorial
By Deborah Snoonian, P.E.

	Each stele was lowered into place with a crane (top). Formwork for the coffered ceiling (middle) followed the site’s lines, and the concrete was left uncoated (above). Courtesy Eisenman Architects

The field of steles (pillars) at Eisenman Architects’ Memorial to the Murdered Jews in Europe [page 120], and the rolling terrain and visitors center they sit on, required close coordination of design and engineering issues during construction.

The 2,711 reinforced, self-compacting concrete steles were prefabricated off-site at an average rate of about 60 per week, depending on their size (the shortest are about 1.6 feet tall; the tallest are 15 feet). The design team and the fabricator, Firma Geithner, checked each stele against an approved prototype before authorizing it for shipment to the site. Meanwhile, the 4.7-acre site was filled in and graded to form the memorial’s gently undulating topography. A grid plan for the steles was laid down, and the site’s soil was then excavated to create individual “terraces” of compacted soil where the steles would sit.

Working with engineers Buro Happold, the design team conceived what are essentially rectangular strip foundations, or footings, to support the steles. Each one is held up by two such footings. Four extra supporting “bumps” fitted with rubber gaskets were added to each footing to accommodate the varying weights and tilt angles of the steles. Installation was completed in December 2004.

As the sitework and stele fabrication progressed, the below-grade visitors center was taking shape. Structurally, it consists of simple retaining walls and concrete columns supporting a poured-in-place concrete coffered ceiling that varies in height as it mimics the rolling topography above. Wood forms were built for the ceiling pour, with wood beams and ribs overlaid by large sheets of plywood to re-create the land form. The construction team used MDF board to hollow out spaces for the 1-foot-deep coffered areas. All the concrete was left uncoated, which contributes to the center’s stark ambience.

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