The Sony Center is a

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

-sponsored complex of eight buildings located at the

Potsdamer Platz Potsdamer Platz (, ''Potsdam Square'') is a public square and traffic intersection in the center of Berlin, Germany, lying about south of the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag (German Parliament Building), and close to the southeast corne ...

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 ...

, Germany, designed by

Helmut Jahn Helmut Jahn (January 4, 1940 – May 8, 2021) was a German-American architect, known for projects such as the Sony Center on Potsdamer Platz in Berlin, Germany; the Messeturm in Frankfurt, Germany; the Thompson Center in Chicago; One Liberty ...

. It opened in 2000 and houses Sony's German headquarters. The

cinemas A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall (Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a ...

in the center were closed at the end of 2019.

History

In the early 20th century, the site was originally home to Berlin's bustling

city center A city centre is the commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart of a city. The term "city centre" is primarily used in British English, and closely equivalent terms exist in other languages, such as "" in Fren ...

. During

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 ...

, it was the location of the infamous Nazi People's Court. Most of the buildings in its vicinage were destroyed or damaged during

. From 1961 onwards, most of the area became part of the "No Man's Land" of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (german: Berliner Mauer, ) was a guarded concrete barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and East Germany (GDR). Construction of the Berlin Wall was commenced by the government ...

, resulting in the destruction of the remaining buildings. After the

fall of the Berlin Wall The fall of the Berlin Wall (german: Mauerfall) on 9 November 1989, during the Peaceful Revolution, was a pivotal event in world history which marked the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the figurative Iron Curtain and one of the series of eve ...

on 9 November 1989, the square became the focus of attention again, as a large (some ), attractive location in the heart of a major European capital city had suddenly become available. As part of a redevelopment effort for the area, the space was to be developed. In 1992, Sony acquired the site from the Berlin city government for 97.2 million German marks, about US$61.6 million. Shortly after, the

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body o ...

briefly investigated whether Sony paid less than the market price. Over the following years, a total of eight buildings were designed by

and Peter Walker as landscape architect, and construction was completed in 2000 at a total cost of 750 million euros. The iconic vaulted roof covering the central open area between the main buildings was engineered and built by

Waagner-Biro Waagner Biro is a Vienna-based group of companies formerly part of the same group which have developed into separately owned, independent companies operating in steel and mechanical engineering. Collectively, the companies have about 1000 employees ...

using steel, glass and translucent fabric. In February 2008 Sony sold the Sony Center for less than 600 million euros to a group of German and US investment funds, including investment bank

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...

Corpus Sireo Corpus is Latin for "body". It may refer to: Linguistics * Text corpus, in linguistics, a large and structured set of texts * Speech corpus, in linguistics, a large set of speech audio files * Corpus linguistics, a branch of linguistics Music * ...

and an affiliate of

The John Buck Company ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

. The group sold the Sony Center to the

National Pension Service The National Pension Service of Korea (NPS; ) is a public pension fund in South Korea. It is the third largest in the world with $800 billion in assets, and is the largest investor in South Korea. South Korea's National Pension Service (NPS), wh ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

for 570 million euros in 2010. In 2017,

Oxford Properties Oxford Properties is a Canadian multinational corporation, with operations in real estate investment, development and property management. Its portfolio includes office, retail, industrial, multi-residential, life sciences and hotel assets. Esta ...

and Madison International Realty acquired the complex for close to 1.1 billion euros. From 1999 until 2019,

CineStar CineStar is a cinema company based in Lübeck, Germany. The company was founded in 1948, and is the largest cinema chain in Germany and Croatia. it had 54 locations in Germany and 14 in Croatia; 13 multiplexes in Czech Republic; 6 in Bosnia a ...

operated a cinema, Cinestar Sony Center, and an

IMAX IMAX is a proprietary system of high-resolution cameras, film formats, film projectors, and theaters known for having very large screens with a tall aspect ratio (approximately either 1.43:1 or 1.90:1) and steep stadium seating. Graeme F ...

theater in the center. Both were used for screenings in the

Berlin International Film Festival The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festi ...

until their closure.

Attractions

The Sony Center contains a mix of shops, restaurants, a

conference center A convention center (American English; or conference centre in British English) is a large building that is designed to hold a convention, where individuals and groups gather to promote and share common interests. Convention centers typica ...

, hotel rooms, around 67 residential units,Aime Williams (October 2, 2017)
Berlin’s Sony Centre sold for over €1bn
''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

''. offices, the Museum of Film and Television, a

Legoland Discovery Center Legoland Discovery Centre is an indoor family attraction chain operated by British leisure group Merlin Entertainments. Featuring models and attractions inspired by the Lego building toys, the Discovery Centres are smaller versions of the Legol ...

, and a "Sony Style" store. Free

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wave ...

is available. During major sports events like the

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Germany 2006, was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to host the ...

, it was also home to a large television screen on which the games were shown to viewers sitting in the large open area in the middle. The Sony Center is located near

Berlin Potsdamer Platz railway station Berlin Potsdamer Platz is a railway station in Berlin. It is completely underground and situated under Potsdamer Platz in central Berlin. Regional and S-Bahn services call at the station, and it is also served by U-Bahn line U2. History ...

, which can be accessed on foot. A large, covered

shopping center A shopping center (American English) or shopping centre (Commonwealth English), also called a shopping complex, shopping arcade, shopping plaza or galleria, is a group of shops built together, sometimes under one roof. The first known collec ...

, the

Mall of Berlin The LP12 Mall of Berlin, or simply Mall of Berlin, is a shopping mall in Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make ...

, is nearby, as are many hotels,

Deutsche Bahn The (; abbreviated as DB or DB AG) is the national railway company of Germany. Headquartered in the Bahntower in Berlin, it is a joint-stock company ( AG). The Federal Republic of Germany is its single shareholder. describes itself as the se ...

central offices, along with an office building that is home to the fastest elevator in Europe.

Gallery

File:Sony center b nacht.jpg, Central forum File:Sony Center Berlin.jpg, Exterior File:Berlin Sony Center Glass Roof 2012.jpg, Glass roof

References

External links

Sony Center Official Site (EN)

Sony Center Official Site (DE)
{{Coord, 52, 30, 36, N, 13, 22, 25, E, region:DE-BE_type:landmark, display=title Buildings and structures in Berlin Skyscrapers in Berlin High-tech architecture Tensile membrane structures Sony Helmut Jahn buildings Skyscraper office buildings in Germany Residential skyscrapers in Germany Skyscraper hotels in Germany Commercial buildings completed in 2000