Not a Palace
...but a place to live...
A somewhat harsh juxtaposition to the royal beauty, lush- and lightness of my previous photos from the palace and the castle garden in my Charlottenburg Palace series. But believe it or not, this 1970s or '80s brutalism-style apartment house (and similar houses) can be found directly next to the castle grounds.
In the 1970s/'80s, what one might call a huge aberration in urban planning was about to take place: old, still of good substance, buildings from the early 20th century and the late 1900s were supposed to be taken down and replaced by tenement blocks.
This happened in many parts of West Berlin, and it had nothing to do with the reconstruction programme of the 1950s and '60s where simple building complexes were raised to make up for the destruction of WWII.
In the 1970s and '80s, the apartments in these old pre-war houses were often of a lower standard, unrenovated, many with stove heating from huge tiled stoves, and some still with outside toilets on the half landing, shared with the other tenants. Don't get me wrong, in my childhood, I lived in all three types of buildings, then modern 1970s residential complexes in the outskirts of West Berlin, a 1960s reconstruction programme house, and a pre-war house with huge tiled stoves (but luckily with our own bathroom/toilet), and all of it was perfectly OK. But the plans of the 1970s/'80s were about destroying huge areas of grown building substance in the middle of the city, and they would have changed the typical "face" of Berlin forever (as can be seen in those areas where the abovementioned plans were realised).
Luckily, people were not taking it, and resistance against those plans formed, culminating in a squatting movement in the late 1970s and early 1980s. This saved many of these old, grown areas in many parts of the city.
To those of you who actually made it to this point: thank you for reading ;) Now for the technical part: My photo is a bracketing HDR made of three images merged in HDR Efex, and further slid in Color Efex Pro and LR. The LX100 Mark II's dynamic range is a noticeable step up from the Mark I and the raised Megapixel count also offers a welcome boost in detail and crispness.
And now, I also managed to read out the shutter count of my pre-owned new-old LX100II (I first practiced getting into the camera's service mode on my LX100I). It only had 155 releases, so it is indeed "as good as new", and on the two photo walks I've used it since purchasing it in April I've already added about 600 shutter releases. Such a great little camera :)
HSS, everyone, and have a great new week spring/autumn week ahead!
Not a Palace
...but a place to live...
A somewhat harsh juxtaposition to the royal beauty, lush- and lightness of my previous photos from the palace and the castle garden in my Charlottenburg Palace series. But believe it or not, this 1970s or '80s brutalism-style apartment house (and similar houses) can be found directly next to the castle grounds.
In the 1970s/'80s, what one might call a huge aberration in urban planning was about to take place: old, still of good substance, buildings from the early 20th century and the late 1900s were supposed to be taken down and replaced by tenement blocks.
This happened in many parts of West Berlin, and it had nothing to do with the reconstruction programme of the 1950s and '60s where simple building complexes were raised to make up for the destruction of WWII.
In the 1970s and '80s, the apartments in these old pre-war houses were often of a lower standard, unrenovated, many with stove heating from huge tiled stoves, and some still with outside toilets on the half landing, shared with the other tenants. Don't get me wrong, in my childhood, I lived in all three types of buildings, then modern 1970s residential complexes in the outskirts of West Berlin, a 1960s reconstruction programme house, and a pre-war house with huge tiled stoves (but luckily with our own bathroom/toilet), and all of it was perfectly OK. But the plans of the 1970s/'80s were about destroying huge areas of grown building substance in the middle of the city, and they would have changed the typical "face" of Berlin forever (as can be seen in those areas where the abovementioned plans were realised).
Luckily, people were not taking it, and resistance against those plans formed, culminating in a squatting movement in the late 1970s and early 1980s. This saved many of these old, grown areas in many parts of the city.
To those of you who actually made it to this point: thank you for reading ;) Now for the technical part: My photo is a bracketing HDR made of three images merged in HDR Efex, and further slid in Color Efex Pro and LR. The LX100 Mark II's dynamic range is a noticeable step up from the Mark I and the raised Megapixel count also offers a welcome boost in detail and crispness.
And now, I also managed to read out the shutter count of my pre-owned new-old LX100II (I first practiced getting into the camera's service mode on my LX100I). It only had 155 releases, so it is indeed "as good as new", and on the two photo walks I've used it since purchasing it in April I've already added about 600 shutter releases. Such a great little camera :)
HSS, everyone, and have a great new week spring/autumn week ahead!