The Bremen Cotton Exchange (german: Bremer Baumwollbörse) was built in 1902 on the

market square The market square (or sometimes, the market place) is a Town square, square meant for trading, in which a market is held. It is an important feature of many towns and cities around the world.Bremen Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...

, Germany, to house the offices of the city's cotton exchange founded in 1872.

Johann Poppe Johann Georg Poppe (12 September 1837 – 18 August 1915), often called Johannes Poppe by English-speaking writers, was a prominent architect in Bremen during the German Gründerzeit and an influential interior designer of ocean liners for the N ...

Neo-Renaissance Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range o ...

facades and carefully finished interiors can still be seen today.

Background

Since 1788, when it first arrived in Bremen on emigrant ships returning from North America, cotton has been an important commodity for the city. In 1894, over a million bales of cotton were unloaded, reaching a maximum of 2.6 million bales in 1927. In 1872, the Committee for the Cotton Trade (''Komité für den Baumwollhandel'') was created to promote the interests of those involved in the cotton market. Banks, shipping companies, cotton mills and insurance companies later became members too. In 1900, work began on the construction of the Cotton Exchange Building in the centre of Bremen. The exchange allowed the trading of Futures in 1914. but the First World War and the ensuing inflation prevented their re-establishment until 1926. The exchange closed again for the

Second World War 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 ...

. During the war, the rear part of the building was destroyed in RAF bombing attacks on Bremen, and the steeple-like tower in front was severely damaged and later pulled down. After repairs, the exchange reopened in 1956. In 1961, a multistory parking garage was built where the rear part of the building had been. Even today, the "Rules of the Bremen Cotton Exchange" serve as a useful reference in drawing up contracts and solving disputes in the international cotton market. The ''Bremer Baumwollbörse'' still has over 200 members (2014) but its offices are now in Wachtstraße.

Architecture

(1837–1915), who had gained a reputation for his skill in designing some of Bremen's large public buildings including the waterworks (1873) and the library (1896), was selected as the architect for the Cotton Exchange. Located on the corner of Wachtstraße and the Marktplatz, the building which originally had five storeys was completed in 1902. It combined the latest structural techniques (becoming Bremen's first

steel-framed Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The developm ...

building) with a high degree of functionality and an imposing

facade. The architecture critic Walter Müller-Wulckow described the Bremen Cotton Exchange, which started to shed its profuse ornamentation after exposure to the elements, as the "crassest" manifestation of "cancerous" building styles.''Die Bremer Baumwollbörse ist das krasseste Beispiel dieser Art, von deren Formenfülle schon kurz nach der Vollendung abblätternde Ornamente Passanten erschlagend herabstürzten und auf diese geradezu groteske Weise die Krebsschäden unserer Baupraxis gezeigt haben.'' - "The crassest example of this kind is the Bremen Cotton Exchange, decorations from it having peeled off beginning soon after completion, to fall and strike passersby and in this utterly grotesque manner demonstrate the cancerous lesions of our mode of building." Cited in ''Heinz Stoffregen, 1879–1929: Architektur zwischen Tradition und Avantgarde'', ed. Nils Aschenbeck, Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1990,
p. 11
As a result of weathering, the richly decorated outer walls of sandstone had to be almost completely renewed from 1922 to 1924 under the supervision of Otto Blendermann. Its carefully designed interiors can still be seen today. Of particular note are the stairway with railings by

Hermann Prell Hermann Prell (29 April 1854 – 18 May 1922) was a German history painter, sculptor and professor at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts. Life and work He was born at Leipzig and studied under Theodor Grosse in Dresden and Karl Gussow in Berlin ...

and the glass mosaics in the main entrance by

Puhl & Wagner Puhl & Wagner was the largest German company for the production of glass mosaics and stained glass. Based in Berlin and headquartered in Neukölln, the company traded from 1889 to 1969. From 1914 to 1933, the firm was known as Puhl & Wagner Gottfri ...

. File:BaumwollboerseBremen-3c.jpg, Staircase File:BaumwollboerseBremen-2a.jpg, Entrance hall mosaics File:BaumwollboerseBremen-DYK.jpg, Mosaic detail File:BaumwollboerseBremen-3a.jpg, Ground-floor corridor File:BaumwollboerseBremen-3n.jpg, Relief

References

External links

Bremen Cotton Exchange website
* {{Coord, 53, 04, 28, N, 8, 48, 26, E, type:landmark_region:DE-HB, display=title Buildings and structures in Bremen (city) Buildings and structures completed in 1902 Gothic Revival architecture in Germany Renaissance Revival architecture in Germany