Studentendorf Schlachtensee

The Studentendorf (student village) Schlachtensee is a heritage listed building complex of residential and community buildings in Berlin. It was built in the 1950s and was planned as a residence for students of the Free University of Berlin. Based on the model of the Studentendorf Schlachtensee, the Studentendorf Adlershof opened in October 2014 on the campus of Humboldt University in Berlin's Adlershof district. The Studentendorf Schlachtensee is located in the southwest of Berlin, in Steglitz-Zehlendorf, in the neighbourhood of [Nikolassee]. The heritage listed part of the student village was built between 1959 and 1964, and financed by a donation from the Government of the United States of America. The Student Village Schlachtensee was the first newly built academic residential complex of post-war Berlin. The Studentendorf Schlachtensee is one of the most important architectural contributions of the Americans to the re-education of the Germans after losing World War II. The aim was to support the education of young people and transform them into citizens of a democratic Germany. The architecture itself was also intended to support the process of overcoming totalitarianism. It was envisaged that the future academic elite of the Federal Republic of Germany would find a home as well as political and democratic education in Schlachtensee. The architecture and many institutions, such as the tutoring program, the village council, working groups established in the village library and other cultural institutions, were born out of this idea and were financed with the generous help of the US State Department. The monumental complex is considered the most important student village not only in Berlin, but European-wide. The Studentendorf of the Freie Universität Berlin, which was its original name, is an ensemble of 28 loosely arranged houses composed as an urban landscape across 5 hectares. The Berlin-based architectural office Hermann Fehling, Daniel Gogel and Peter Pfankuch designed the buildings of the first and second building phase of the Studentenndorf.