This documentary series traces with the help of filmed archives and photographs often unpublished The reconstruction of four cities destroyed by the war. A beautiful lesson in history and urbanism.
How are four European cities hard hit by destruction during the Second World War managed to rebuild after such chaos? To illustrate this problem, Quentin Domart and Barbara Necek, authors of this documentary series, have chosen Le Havre, Warsaw, Berlin and London.
Good choice, even if a second series is imaginable with the cases also emblematic Caen, Coventry, Dresden or Rotterdam. Distributed after this Thursday 24, episodes dedicated to Le Havre then in Warsaw are very successful. Berlin and London are scheduled Thursday, March 31st.
Time the historical and remarkable remarkable removals of urbanism, these episodes trace, with the help of filmed archives and photographic often unpublished, of testimonials of former inhabitants, lighting of architects and historians , how to reinvest and reinvent a martyred city.
In Le Havre, occupied in June 1940 by the Germans and then ravaged in September 1944 by British air raids with a phenomenal intensity, the juxtapositions of photos of the same district before-war and then just after show the magnitude damage.
city martyrdom in city concept
Thousands of Havra survive in cellars or fortune camps left by American soldiers. In visit on October 7, 1944, Charles de Gaulle, touched by the magnitude of the disaster, decides to make the city the symbol of the rebirth of the country. Designated master of this great reconstruction project: the famous architect Auguste Perret (1874-1954). His roadmap? Rebuild quickly and at least costs.
“Since we are at zero, we must take advantage of it to leave on new bases,” proclaims this precursor of the armed concrete (“my concrete is more beautiful than the stone!”). In the company of other architects responsible for respecting its principles, it will bring out of land a modernist and detached mineral downtown, carefully studied in this documentary.
Death in 1954, Perret will not see his construction completed. Neither the rejection by the traumatized Havera of this new center, which will take time to be tamed. But to move from city martyrdom to city concept remains an example of a pretty fascinating transformation. The port city will be listed in July 2005 by UNESCO World Heritage.
In Warsaw, destroyed 85% by the Germans and who housed 1,300,000 inhabitants before the war, in 1945, only 162,000 survivors in the midst of ruins and rubble. Very quickly, the new communist government decides to rebuild the Polish capital, firmly encouraged by Stalin. As early as February 1945, 1,500 architects and urban planners get to work. Almost completely destroyed, the old town is rebuilt almost identically with the chief architect Jan Zachwatowicz and his teams. In three years, 700 historic buildings are reborn from their ashes. In 1948, on the site of the former Ghetto Jew in Muranow, an area of housing inspired by the 1930s’ modernism brought the day.
After allowing a great freedom to the architects, the power launches in 1949 typed programs “socialist realism”. The buildings of the MDM neighborhood or the iconic palace of culture and science, upper 230 meters, are always there to testify.
