The Frankfurter Tor ("Frankfurt Gate") is a large square in the inner-city

Friedrichshain Friedrichshain () is a quarter (''Ortsteil'') of the borough of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg in Berlin, Germany. From its creation in 1920 until 2001, it was a freestanding city borough. Formerly part of East Berlin, it is adjacent to Mitte, Prenz ...

locality of

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. It is situated in the centre of the district, at the intersection of

Karl-Marx-Allee Karl-Marx-Allee ( en, Karl Marx Alley) is a monumental socialist boulevard built by the GDR between 1952 and 1960 in Berlin Friedrichshain and Mitte. Today the boulevard is named after Karl Marx. It should not be confused with the ''Karl-Marx ...

and

Frankfurter Allee The Frankfurter Allee is one of the oldest roads of Berlin, the capital city of Germany. It extends the Karl-Marx-Allee from Frankfurter Tor in the direction of the city of Frankfurt (Oder). It is part of Bundesstraße 1 and has a length of . ...

(the eastbound federal highways No. 1 and No. 5) with the

Warschauer Straße Warschauer Straße is a major thoroughfare in the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg district of central Berlin, the capital of Germany. The street begins at Frankfurter Tor to the north and spans 1.6km south to the intersection of the Oberbaumbrücke, Mü ...

and Petersburger Straße ring road (federal highway No. 96a). The Frankfurter Tor station, on the city's

U-Bahn Rapid transit in Germany consists of four U-Bahn systems and fourteen S-Bahn systems. The U-Bahn commonly understood to stand for Untergrundbahn (''underground railway'') are conventional rapid transit systems that run mostly underground, while ...

line , is located under the square.

History

The previously unnamed square received the name "Frankfurter Tor" on 8 November 1957 in the course of its reconstruction after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The designation recalls both the historic city gate of the

Berlin Customs Wall The Berlin Customs Wall (German: "Berliner Zoll- und Akzisemauer", literally ''Berlin customs and excise wall'' the German term had been originally "Akzisemauer" / excise wall but with the fading knowledge of the term "excise" most references inco ...

, providing access to the road to the city of

Frankfurt (Oder) Frankfurt (Oder), also known as Frankfurt an der Oder (), is a city in the German state of Brandenburg. It has around 57,000 inhabitants, is one of the easternmost cities in Germany, the fourth-largest city in Brandenburg, and the largest German ...

, as well as two former street names, Große Frankfurter Straße and Frankfurter Allee, for the

Wilhelmine The Wilhelmine Period () comprises the period of German history between 1890 and 1918, embracing the reign of Kaiser Wilhelm II in the German Empire from the resignation of Chancellor Otto von Bismarck until the end of World War I and Wilhelm' ...

east–west axis of the major intersection at this location. The original location of the gate, however, was approximately west of today's Frankfurter Tor intersection, near Weberwiese station. The densely built-up area was largely destroyed by the

bombing of Berlin in World War II A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-transmitted mechanica ...

and the

Battle of Berlin The Battle of Berlin, designated as the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, and also known as the Fall of Berlin, was one of the last major offensives of the European theatre of World War II. After the Vistula– ...

in 1945. Both Große Frankfurter Straße and Frankfurter Allee were renamed Stalinallee in 1949 in honor of the Soviet leader. In a clandestine operation in 1961 after Stalin's personality cult had been denounced by the Soviet Union the western portion of Stalinallee, the former Große Frankfurter Straße, was given the name Karl-Marx-Allee, and the eastern portion received back its former name, Frankfurter Allee. The prominent twin towers on the western side of the square, significant examples of the Stalinist architectural style, were built between 1953 and 1956 as part of the

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...

Stalinallee ensemble according to plans designed by

Hermann Henselmann Hermann Henselmann (3 February 1905 – 19 January 1995) was a German architect most famous for his buildings constructed in East Germany during the 1950s and 1960s. Early years Henselmann was born in Roßla and studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule ...

Their architecture evokes the idea of a city entrance (thus the designation "Tor", gate, gateway), because the height of their domed towers and their location form a prominent beginning for today's Karl-Marx-Allee, once the imposing western portion of Stalinallee. The tops of the two towers are in the style of the domes designed by

Carl von Gontard Carl Philipp Christian von Gontard (13 January 1731 in Mannheim – 23 September 1791 in Breslau) was a German architect who worked primarily in Berlin, Potsdam, and Bayreuth in the style of late Baroque Classicism. Next to Knobelsdorff he was c ...

for

Gendarmenmarkt The Gendarmenmarkt ( en, Gut Market) is a square in Berlin and the site of an architectural ensemble including the Berlin concert hall and the French and German Churches. In the centre of the square stands a monumental statue of poet Fr ...

. The buildings, square and street intersection at Frankfurter Tor are a listed ensemble, protected for its historic relevance.

References

{{coord, 52, 30, 57, N, 13, 27, 15, E, region:DE-BE_type:railwaystation_source:dewiki, display=title Squares in Berlin Buildings and structures in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg Twin towers