Built over the Berlin Wall, this futuristic glass cube features 13 transparent bridges

A faceted glass building rises over the former Berlin Wall in the middle of Berlin’s media district, its sharp geometry giving it the look of a futuristic diamond. This is the Axel Springer Campus, a vast headquarters for companies belonging to the German media group.

Designed by Rem Koolhaas and his Office for Metropolitan Architecture, the building opened in 2020. Its floor area is equivalent to roughly 35 tennis courts, while an open central courtyard has a volume comparable to 40 Olympic swimming pools. Thirteen transparent bridges cross the building’s interior void.

After passing security checks at Zimmerstraße 50 and registering with a QR code, visitors enter a building designed less like a conventional office than a shared newsroom complex. Employees move through 13 transparent floors with lounges, cafés and restaurants. One floor includes a kitchen where journalists can meet and prepare lunch together.

Andreas Ludwigs, managing director of Axel Springer Services & Real Estate GmbH, said the company moved almost all its units into the building after the pandemic because personal contact had gained importance. “We decided to move almost all the units to this building because, after Covid, we realized that personal contact is very important. Things get solved faster if you have five people in one room than if they are scattered,” he said.

About 3,000 people from 1,000 countries work in what the company calls the Axel Springer Neubau, or new building. Bild and Welt operate there alongside shopping platform Idealo, advertising marketer Media Impact, Business Insider Germany and Politico Germany. The group’s recent acquisitions include the historic British newspaper The Telegraph.

The complex also carries a piece of Axel Cäsar Springer’s history. A section contains a replica of the small first office used by the German journalist in Hamburg. The company now occupies about 50 buildings in Berlin alone, Ludwigs said.

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We decided to move almost all the units to this building because, after Covid, we realized that personal contact is very important. Things get solved faster if you have five people in one room than if they are scattered.