The EAST | WEST collaboration : postwar rebuilding and transnational representations of memory, recovery, and reconciliation

This research examines the reconstruction of European cities after the devastation of the Second World War as a result of transnationally led design processes. It pursues this claim by addressing urban rebuilding and its design principles as the subject of transnational exchange and dialogue. Thus the study identifies materials and sources that fundamentally justify the reintegration of ‘Ostmoderne’ as ‘Moderne im Osten’ into a shared German and European architectural historiography. The study argues that the architectural development in Europe during the Cold War era was not driven by an ideological competition of forms and interpretations. The often-cited East-West urban competition is scrutinised as a political narrative for which state authorities subsequently instrumentalised architecture to advance their ideological positions. The study elaborates how architects defied ideological narratives and undermined Cold War rivalries. In this sense, the work also regards architecture as an opportunity to subvert ideological attributions. Thus, architects and urban planners acquired a specific scope to negotiate design ideas and planning principles according to and, simultaneously, against authorities and state organs. The emphasis on so-called ‘rooms for maneuver’ forms the backdrop to examine architects and urban planners’ activities, especially in the GDR. ‘Pathways of knowledge’ pursue reconstruction strategies through various channels across political and ideological boundaries and identify transnationalism, reconciliation, and international understanding as impulses for architectural and urban planning. By documenting how planning principles were communicated and adapted, the research foregrounds how strategies were renegotiated on-site to adjust them to local requirements. ‘Exchange scenarios’ reveal the diversity and complexity of these communication formats. In addition, the work examines the role of architectural congresses and professional networks, such as the Union Internationale des Architectes (International Union of Architects, UIA), informal contacts between architects from East and West Berlin, town twinning, and municipal internationalism. Concrete examples evidence the impact of local concepts, such as the reconstruction of Warsaw or the rebuilding of Coventry, on the transnational development of post-war architecture and planning. A short catalogue section, which for six case studies – Warsaw, Kiel, Dresden, Coventry, East and West Berlin – specifically demonstrates how transnational activities are inscribed in the rebuilt city’s urban fabric, follows the theoretical examination of exchange formats and networks