Banana Bunker
Monkey business in the air-raid shelter
Bananas are bananas, bunkers are bunkers, and no’ere but Berlin shall the twain meet. Any monkey coming to the city will want to see the Banana Bunker. They’ll go ape-shit when they find their favorite fruit has been replaced by contemporary art. It’s still monkey business, just nothing to eat.
Chief Nazi architect Albert Speer wasn’t thinking of any of this when he approved the bunker’s design. He couldn’t have known it would be used to host bananas and techno parties, or an art collection after that.In fairness, most of what Speer imagined when he was Berlin’s general building inspector didn’t go the way he expected. Berlin has always laughed in the face of the best-laid plans and “Germania” was just bananas.
The Banana Bunker on Reinhardtstraße was constructed using forced labor. It now serves as a private museum for Christian Boros and his wife Karen to show their collection of contemporary art to people prepared to pay €18 to see it.
Designed by Karl Bonatz under Speer’s watch in 1941, the imposing five-story overground bunker was built in just six months the following year to provide an air-raid shelter for passengers from the nearby Friedrichstraße railway station – hence its official name, “Reichsbahnbunker Friedrichstraße.”
Apparently, Speer wanted to construct 1,000 underground air-raid bunkers for the city’s bomb-weary people, but only 120 were built by 1941. So above-ground bunkers that could hold more people were the way to go.
What was later to become known as the Banana Bunker was actually one of two twin bunkers constructed for Reichsbahn customers. Another similar structure at Ostbahnhof (then Schlesischer Bahnhof) was torn down in 1947.
According to Mattias Donath’s guide to Nazi architecture, in August 1943 there were 413 bunkers for some 200,000 people – only around 5% of the population, but they did indeed save lives during Allied bombing raids.
“The bunkers, in addition to offering protection, also served as a psychological function. It was hoped that in providing life-saving ‘bunker security,’ the structures would limit the demoralizing impact of the bombing raids,” Donath wrote.
Architecturally, the banana bunker is a remarkable building, perfectly square with each of its four sides the same, a completely symmetrical design like Andrea Palladio’s Villa La Rotonda. The outside walls are 2.1 meters thick. The roof was three meters of reinforced concrete.
The bunker is crowned by a heavy console cornice with large, indented corners. The narrow window slits have protruding frames, accentuating their smallness. Each side has an identical one-story protruding entrance with arched doorways. The bare concrete surface was to be covered with natural stone after the war.
Inside, behind a gas-tight door system, there are four double-staircases that ensured people could enter quickly during an air raid.
“Behind the meter-thick walls and outer rooms including the four stairwells lies a window-less bunker core that is divided into eight chambers on each level. The air-raid bunker contained 3,088 seats and 48 beds,” Donath wrote.
“The bunker was of militarily and political importance,” he added. “The fortress-like architecture was supposed to demonstrate the invincibility of the German army and reinforce faith in the final victory that had wavered as a result of the massive bomb attacks.”
So much for that idea. The wavering was justified.
Up to 5,000 mostly women and children crammed into its low-ceilinged thick walls as the bombs rained down on the German capital. The men were fighting at the front, invading or being pushed back. C’est la guerre.
The Soviets took over after the war, and no doubt looted anything they could find of value to bring back home. They ran the bunker as a prison for Nazi delinquents or anyone else whose jibs were not cut to their liking.
It was handed back to the newly created East German state in 1949, when it was repurposed to store textiles.
Then in 1957, after its fridge-like qualities were discovered, it was given to VEB Obst Gemüse Speisekartoffeln (OGS), which used it to store bananas and other exotic fruits from Cuba.
That’s when the locals first called it the Banana Bunker. Of course, they never got a sniff of a banana themselves. Fancy fruit was only reserved for the top gorillas in charge.
It was during this time that the first alterations to the bunker were carried out. Entrances for the fruit were cut through the outside walls, ruining the otherwise perfect symmetry.
Once the Berlin Wall came down and Germany was reunified, the Banana Bunker lost its raison d'être – until it found yet another.
Werner Voller opened the techno club “Bunker” in 1992, when it apparently became famed as the “hardest club in the world” for its hardcore techno, gabber, trance, house and breakbeat parties over four poorly ventilated levels.
There were wild S&M, fetish and fantasy parties in the separate “Red Cross Club,” where the saying was, “party till the doctor comes.” But apparently the actual Red Cross wasn’t happy with all the shenanigans and the club’s name was changed to Ex-Cross-Club in 1995.
On Dec. 31, 1995, the Silvester party “The Last Days of Saigon” was banned, but it went ahead anyway. It proved to be the final hurrah.
Police and safety regulations shut down “Bunker” in 1996, though couldn’t prevent it spawning copycat clubs like Ostgut, KitKatClub and Berghain.
Its closure also inspired the start of the annual Fuckparade in 1997. The next Fuckparade takes place Sept. 9, mark your calendars!
The German state, desperate to get rid of anything of value, sold the Banana Bunker for 1DM to Nippon Development Corporation GmbH in 2001.
The real estate investor sold it on in turn two years later, no doubt for a fruitful profit, to advertising agency founder Christian Boros, who had been on the lookout for somewhere to show his vast collection of art.
More alterations on the “Denkmalgeschütztes Gebäude” (protected building) followed, which involved cutting through the thick walls and ceilings inside to create more space and connections between floors and rooms, as well as the construction of the luxury penthouse for the Boros family on top.
This involved cutting through the 3-meter-thick roof to install a lift and staircase. You can still see the jagged twists of metal shorn off in the concrete. Altogether, some 150 cubic meters of concrete was removed
It’s not usually permitted to build on top of protected structures. According to a bunker tour guide, the Boros family allegedly got around the building regulations by telling the planning authorities that the penthouse apartment was the “ground floor” and everything else was below it because bunkers are usually underground. And apparently this was good enough for the authorities. It doesn’t sound fishy at all and I’m sure there were no underhand dealings involving great sums of money to the right people.
The work was completed in 2007 and the Boros’ first exhibition opened the following year. The art is displayed in four-year cycles and can only be seen if you pay €18 for a guided tour. They’re always booked up weeks in advance. Unfortunately, there’s no other way in.
The art pieces are fun and frivolous, carefree in contrast to the environment in which they find themselves. They seem violently at odds with the somber history and with the memory of all who were involved in the bunker’s creation. Maybe that’s the point.
Location and access (How to find guide)
What: The Banana Bunker, a former air-raid shelter build by forced laborers to provide protection for Berliners against the overhead bombing raids during World War 2, later a fruit-storage facility, then a techno club, and now a fancy and exclusive art gallery and home for its proprietors. You won't find any information about the building outside, nor any sign of remorse or even acknowledgement of the people who were forced to build it.
An "Abandon Berlin" sticker on a pole outside maintains a lonely protest against Germany's current shameful transgressions, now extending over more than 10 months.
Where: Reinhardtstraße 20, 10117 Berlin.
How to get there: Get the S-Bahn to Friedrichstraße, or a U-Bahn or tram to Oranienburger Tor, and walk from there.
Getting in: Unfortunately you’ll need to pretend to be interested in the art and cough up €18 to prove your interest. It’s the only way unless you sneak in when the door is ajar and no one is looking. I don’t recommend that though because there are cameras and you’ll likely be caught very quickly and forced to reckon with consequences that rich people can demand. Here’s the link for booking a tour: https://www.sammlung-boros.de/en/booking
When to go: Go when your tour is on, or any time if you just want to see it from outside.
Difficulty rating: 1/10 for those who can afford it, 10/10 for those who can’t.
Who to bring: It really doesn’t matter.
What to bring: Bring a jumper as it’s cooler in the bunker than outside. Bring a camera though you’re not allowed take photos (after paying €18!) – you can take sneaky shots when your tour guide isn’t looking.
Dangers: Poverty. No need to worry about air raids, though.
Filed 10/8/2024
