villa justitia.
every year in september the day of the open memorial offers you the chance to take a look inside various buildings who are officially landmarked. it's pretty cool, because you get to see buildings that under normal circumstances you rarely get any access to. and even for free! the villa justitia on uhlandstraße was one of those listed landmarks that opened its doors for visitors last year. the villa is a wonderful example of wilhelminian architecture, which was a style that mixed historism with ( back then ) modern schools of construction. villa justitia is a mixture of english tudor, gothic & art nouveau, and if i may say so, it's a highly decorative building. it was erected in 1903 by christian dähne for private use, but as time went by it had a lot more functions over the decades. from the film company thora to a music publisher and now a law office it went through quite a lot of purposes.
inside the villa everything's pretty neutral, but you can still find beautiful elements of the past. especially the ceiling in the foyer is real eye-catcher ( and the big schiele painting on the wall, which was my personal highlight! )
some more details of the villa. there's so much to take in, almost too much. those historism buildings are quite elaborate.
little oriel & wooden balcony.
my favourite thing about this building were the balconies and its beautifully designed balustrades. just like a tiny castle!
here you can see a typical element of art nouveau buildings, the head sculpture. they are often allegorical figurines and are distinctly sharp edged.
after my visit to this landmark i decided to head for a walk.
we have quite a few art nouveau buildings in wiesbaden. this one was just around the corner of the villa justitia. it's another christian dähne building, but this time completely different. now you can see the art nouveau elements much better and it almost feels a little art deco already. the lines are much cleaner & less elaborate. the house was built in 1904, only one year after villa justitia.
the same building from the front. it has quite a few classical elements as well.
i kind of liked the plants on the pillared balcony.
passed by a really overgrown house that had some mid-century vibes.
mosaic fountain basin. with plants instead of water.
the former fountain belonged to this building, which i couldn't take a better picture of. another art nouveau gem! i know though, that it was built in 1908 by paul dietzsch.
found a battered butterfly on the ground.
another essential architecture style in wiesbaden is the mid-century/modernist one. stumbling upon these is really exciting, because they hide behind contemporary facades very often! it's very difficult sometimes to distinguish contemporary, classical modern & post-war modernism, but when you know when various quarters were developed and that most cities in germany were rebuilt after world war II you can roughly tell apart what is classical & what is contemporary. this appartment building is neighbor to the art nouveau house i mentioned earlier. and this is also something i really like about wiesbaden ( i guess it rings true for most cities in germany, though ), the juxtaposition between new & old.
this historicized building from 1896 was planned by franz berger and that it was so wonderfully surrounded by all the greenery made it extra charming.
better picture of the mansion.
quite a majestic sight.
i couldn't get enough of it. turret & roof details.
this is a little overexposed, but it shows the green environment very well. such a romantic place.
another mid-century gem, with nods to history. really liked the mary figurine above the entry & also the ironwork of the gates.
st. josefs-hospital. also called the joho. the hospital buildings are from the 60ies, but still look really cool today.
the main entry.
some of the nearby walls were overgrown with wine leaves. that was the first time i noticed the colour change! i immediately fell in love, like i always do.
peek-a-boo #1.
reaching out.
i slowly removed myself from the mansion district & made my way through some concrete parts of town, finding some kind of cave painting inspired graffitis.
brutalism meets nature.
an abandoned shop in the middle of a residential neighborhood. the black tiles & red door frames did it for me. definitely had a mid-century feel to it.
mirrored buildings are always very interesting to me. there's something so futuristic about them. this is the headquarter for the dbv - a german clerk insurance.
peek-a-boo #2! had to take off the jacket, because it was really warm that day!
i love when you can see the sky and the surroundings inside the windows of buildings.
more geometrical details of a different structure nearby ( but still part of the dbv complex ).
probably my most favourite high-rise in wiesbaden: the zircon tower. the golden windows and the black facade complement each other so damn well 😍 this international style building was erected in the early 70ies.
right next to it there's the turquoise blue building of the heico holding.
more colour-changing overgrowth, this time on bricks.
the twigs always look like they are reaching for a special something.
returning to art nouveau mansions.
theodor wiederspahn built this in 1908. it was definitely not a common sight back in the day, and completely broke with traditional construction. such a neat building ❤
another wiederspahn building, this time from 1905. theo wiederspahn emigrated to brazil in 1908 and helped design even more buildings there.
this doggo guarded the door of the mansion.
the doorway arch was especially intriguing. so flowery!
let's move on to another really cool building around the corner: the former headquarters of a company called didier. it's now part of the regional board of hessia, more exactly the environmental agency. you cannot really guess it via this picture, but it's actually a mid-century modern building erected in 1950/51 by ludwig minner.
while the overall layout is distinctly mid-century, there are pretty details like the balustrades with the wheel structures that are quite untypical. the whole building feels really elegant & not at all clumsy.
it sits in a quarter that is full of old mansions, but instead of completely standing out amidst the historic structures it's actually blending in ( i guess because of the aforementioned embellishments - and the many trees surrounding it. )
hello beautiful brickstone villa! it's quite a bit older than most of the buildings in the area, from 1886 to be exact. it was build by someone called a. von der heydt.
one of my last stops was the newest addition of the state chancellery of hessia. really fascinating with its small windows & the slit gaps. down in the ground floor you can park the cars & up on those other three floors there are offices & a presentation hall. love the smooth rock facade.
right next to the addition you can peek the yellow blinds of the old chancellery building ( which is still used ). it's from 1960.
the biggest project right now in wiesbaden is the completion of the multi-purpose hall rhein-main congress center. it's almost finished as of february 2018, but back in september they were still very busy with the construction. as soon as it officially opens i will make sure to visit it again ( i live just a few streets away ) and document the building. from what i've seen by now, it will definitely be worth the wait. pretty airy & light structure!
and last but not least: have a bright rainbow ( and another not so bright one if you look closely ). definitely a good way to end a city walk.
late summer/early autumn rain showers are always the best. the earth smells so nice and the sky's so dramatic.
picture-perfect.
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