Leipzig
Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as ...
, Germany. At tall, it is the second-tallest building in Leipzig as of 2023. Constructed for the GDR hotel chain
Interhotel
Interhotel was an East German chain of luxury hotels. It was founded in 1965 as a chain.
Originally, the hotel chain consisted of a hotel each in Berlin, Erfurt, Jena and Magdeburg, two hotels in Chemnitz (then Karl-Marx-Stadt) and five hotels i ...
as Hotel Merkur, the hotel has been operated by
Westin
Westin Hotels & Resorts is an American upscale hotel chain owned by Marriott International. , the Westin Brand has 226 properties with 82,608 rooms in multiple countries in addition to 58 hotels with 15,741 rooms in the pipeline.
History Wester ...
since 2003. It features 436 rooms on 27 floors, of which 17 are guest floors and three are office floors. There is a swimming pool and a wellness area on the fourth floor. The building houses the ''Gusto'', ''Brühl'' and ''Falco'' restaurants and the ''Shinto'' bar/lounge.
History
Planning
In the concept for the Leipzig Trade Fair in 1971, the construction of additional hotels for trade fair visitors from abroad was a priority task. The
urban planner
An urban planner (also known as town planner) is a professional who practices in the field of town planning, urban planning or city planning.
An urban planner may focus on a specific area of practice and have a title such as city planner, town ...
s from the office of the chief architect of the city of Leipzig had examined and proposed several locations. But things turned out differently. The draft by the architects from Tokyo's ''Kajima Corporation'' was already complete; the only thing that had to be done in Leipzig was finding a suitable plot of land and making it available. A location was chosen that had not previously been intended for a high-rise dominant.
The contract to build the 5-star hotel was signed in 1978 between the ''GDR foreign trade company Limex'' and the ''Japan GDR Project Company''. Kajima took over the project planning and execution. The cost of construction was 16.1 billion Japanese yen. This corresponded to around 157 million
Deutschmarks
The Deutsche Mark (; English: ''German mark''), abbreviated "DM" or "D-Mark" (), was the official currency of West Germany from 1948 until 1990 and later the unified Germany from 1990 until the adoption of the euro in 2002. In English, it was ...
at an average exchange rate traded on international exchange markets on 1 January 1981. The foundation stone was laid in September 1978. All of the
precast concrete
Precast concrete is a construction product produced by casting concrete in a reusable mold or "form" which is then cured in a controlled environment, transported to the construction site and maneuvered into place; examples include precast bea ...
parts needed to build the outer facades were delivered from
West Berlin
West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...
. On 31 January 1981 Kajima handed over the import object to the Interhotel association.
Hotel Merkur
The Hotel Merkur opened on 13 March 1981, timed to the opening of the ''Frühjahrsmesse'' (Spring Trade Show), In addition to ministers and state secretaries of the GDR, about 100 representatives of Japanese business were present.
The construction company (shell construction) was
Dyckerhoff & Widmann
Dyckerhoff & Widmann AG (Dywidag) was a construction company based in Munich, Germany (formerly based in Karlsruhe, Wiesbaden and Berlin, Germany).
History
The company was founded under the name ''Lang & Co.'' in 1865 by the German cement pioneer ...
AG (DYWIDAG Berlin/West branch), which also had the precast concrete parts delivered from West Berlin. The elevators were installed by a Japanese company. ''AB Svenska Fläktfabriken'' from Sweden handled the heating, air conditioning and plumbing. East German companies were involved in the construction, from the interior fittings to the flat roof sealing (VEB Spezialbau
Magdeburg
Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river.
Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebu ...
) and plumbing (sheet metal work).
When it opened, the Hotel Merkur had 447 air-conditioned rooms and apartments with 700 beds, twelve restaurants, bars and clubs with a total of 800 seats – including ''Sakura'', the second Japanese restaurant in the GDR after a restaurant in
Suhl
Suhl () is a city in Thuringia, Germany, located SW of Erfurt, NE of Würzburg and N of Nuremberg. With its 37,000 inhabitants, it is the smallest of the six urban districts within Thuringia. Together with its northern neighbour-town Zella- ...
– as well as five salons and a 265-seat banquet and convention center. The hotel employed 740 people, including 110 at the
Intershop
Intershop was a chain of government-owned and operated retail stores in the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany) in which only hard currencies (and later Forum checks) could be used to purchase high-quality goods, usually from or asso ...
. The hotel had 15 in-house vehicles from the
Wartburg
The Wartburg () is a castle originally built in the Middle Ages. It is situated on a precipice of to the southwest of and overlooking the town of Eisenach, in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It was the home of St. Elisabeth of Hungary, the ...
Volvo
The Volvo Group ( sv, Volvokoncernen; legally Aktiebolaget Volvo, shortened to AB Volvo, stylized as VOLVO) is a Swedish multinational manufacturing corporation headquartered in Gothenburg. While its core activity is the production, distributio ...
brands. The hotel also had its own passport and visa office.
In January 1987 the 15th Congress of Internists met in the hotel, in April the International Congress of the
Anatomical Society The Anatomical Society (AS), previously known as the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland or ASGBI was founded in London in 1887 to "promote, develop and advance research and education in all aspects of anatomical science".
The society o ...
; in September of the same year, the 23rd anniversary of the
European Association for the Study of Diabetes
The European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) is a scientific association founded in Montecatini Terme, Italy in 1965 with Joseph Hoet as Founding President. The aims of the association are to encourage and support research in the fiel ...
. On 8 March 1990, Leipzig's first
casino
A casino is a facility for certain types of gambling. Casinos are often built near or combined with hotels, resorts, restaurants, retail shopping, cruise ships, and other tourist attractions. Some casinos are also known for hosting live entertai ...
opened in the hotel. In the top ten list of the ''Allgemeine Hotel- und Gastronomie-Zeitung (AHGZ)'' in 1991, the ''Hotel Merkur'' was ranked 8th among the best hotels in Germany.
The
Treuhandanstalt
The (" Trust agency"), colloquially referred to as , was an agency established by the government of the German Democratic Republic to reprivatise/privatise East German enterprises, Volkseigene Betriebe (VEBs), prior to German reunification. C ...
initially continued to run the Interhotels, but later sold it to
investor
An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some species of property. Type ...
s.
Inter-Continental Leipzig
On 1 January 1993, the Hotel Merkur became the Hotel Inter-Continental Leipzig, managed by Inter-Continental Hotels. Between 1993 and 1994, a total of 43 million DM was invested in the renovation and conversion of the house. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Inter-Continental Hotels & Resorts, the hotel initiated the environmental and benefit campaign "One Day for Leipzig" in 1996.
The Westin Leipzig
At the end of 2002,
Westin Hotels & Resorts
Westin Hotels & Resorts is an American upscale hotel chain owned by Marriott International. , the Westin Brand has 226 properties with 82,608 rooms in multiple countries in addition to 58 hotels with 15,741 rooms in the pipeline.
History Wester ...
assumed management of the four-star hotel and it was renamed The Westin Leipzig on 1 January 2003. On 28 April 2005, the Falco restaurant opened on the 27th floor under the direction of Peter Maria Schnurr. In 2007 the
gourmet
Gourmet (, ) is a cultural idea associated with the culinary arts of fine food and drink, or haute cuisine, which is characterized by refined, even elaborate preparations and presentations of aesthetically balanced meals of several contrasting, of ...
restaurant received its first Michelin star and in 2008 the Falco received its second Michelin star. It was the first restaurant in the new federal states with two Michelin stars. According to media reports from November 2023, the restaurant will be closed forever because it is no longer viable due to a lack of skilled workers and immensely increased costs.
On the occasion of the hotel's 30th anniversary (2011), Bild published details from the Stasi file of the ''Hotel Merkur'' with "personal records of sex for sale, clumsy spies and hotel employees who even betrayed their own colleagues".
Gil Ofarim incident
In October 2021, the hotel received extensive negative media coverage, after singer
Gil Ofarim
Gil Doron Reichstadt Ofarim (born 13 August 1982) is a German singer, songwriter, and actor, also known as the lead singer of the bands Zoo Army and Acht.
Early life
Ofarim is the first child of Israeli musician Abi Ofarim (1937–2018), whose ...
claimed to have received Anti-semitic treatment from a receptionist, because of his Star of David necklace. The employee filed a defamation complaint against Ofarim and a
threatening
A threat is a communication of intent to inflict harm or loss on another person. Intimidation is a tactic used between conflicting parties to make the other timid or psychologically insecure for coercion or control. The act of intimidation for c ...
complaint based on
social media
Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...
posts. The hotel initially put two employees on leave and hired a law firm to investigate. This found no evidence of criminal or
labor law
Labour laws (also known as labor laws or employment laws) are those that mediate the relationship between workers, employing entities, trade unions, and the government. Collective labour law relates to the tripartite relationship between employee, ...
measures against the employees. The case was submitted to the
public prosecutor
A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the case in a criminal tria ...
's office for legal review. According to media reports, no chain with a visible Star of David could be identified on the surveillance videos of the hotel. After the investigation was completed, the public prosecutor's office in Leipzig dropped the case against the hotel employee and brought charges of defamation and false suspicion against Ofarim. The trial against Ofarim began on 7 November 2023, with ten trial days scheduled. Ofarim admitted during the trial that he had lied and fabricated the incident. He apologized to the hotel's manager and was ordered to pay a fine of €10,000 to the Jewish community of Leipzig and the House of the Wannsee Conference, a Holocaust museum in Berlin. Ofarim was condemned by the Central Council of Jews in Germany, which said he had done "great damage to the victims of genuine antisemitism."
Awards
* 2007 ''Restaurant of the Year'' for the Falco
* 2007 first Michelin star for the Falco
* 2008 second Michelin star for the Falco
* Wolfgang Hocquél, ''Leipzig. Architektur von der Romanik bis zur Gegenwart'', 2. stark erweiterte Auflage, Passage Verlag, Leipzig 2004, ISBN 3-932900-54-5, p. 173f.
* Annette Menting, ''Leipzig. Architektur und Kunst'', Reclams Städteführer,
Times of Israel
''The Times of Israel'' is an Israeli multi-language online newspaper that was launched in 2012. It was co-founded by Israeli journalist David Horovitz, who is also the founding editor, and American billionaire investor Seth Klarman.