Interview at Cologne Cinemas: “There was no room for care”

This is almost normal.

Please what?

To me, this is mainly a communication problem. If you want to renovate something in an old building, that is, in an existing building, there are a lot of risks. The city initially acted with the best of intentions, as it had the goal of keeping the interim as low as possible in order to save money and create a good state of affairs for the arts as quickly as possible.

Construction time was planned for three years in 2012, quite sporty.

Yes. The foundation stone was laid a year after construction began, which is a very short, very short time. Careful analysis of the house during gaming is rarely possible or only to a limited extent. When the last curtain fell in 2012, in my opinion you could not know enough about the house and its technical systems. But if you lay the foundation stone after one year to indicate progress, and celebrate the topping-out ceremony even after one year, it seems very ambitious. There was no room for necessary care.

Does this mean that?

I suspect that on the one hand the contracts with the companies did not take into account how complex the construction project is and whether the companies could do this work adequately. On the other hand: with a neutral monitoring of the company, which investigates intensively, a construction owner is not so surprised by the undesirable development at the construction site. Then the customer notices much in advance that he has to intervene.

Are municipalities renewing that easy?

Yes. This type of project is extremely complex, it is usually underestimated.

Also a small number that waves through a city council?

Yes. This is a chronic problem of public decision making. Once I was in charge of a large cultural project as an architect, when the Prime Minister called the city an hour before a press conference and asked to know the construction costs, naming them. The city refused, he wanted them anyway – and then they produced some kind of number that was obviously too small. Of course, this political pressure does not work.

Was it correct to assume that today’s technology could be installed in an opera building from the 1950s?

No. Not at all. of course you can. But this requires careful analysis and planning. And willingness to pay companies accordingly.