Red Townhall

The Berlin city hall, the so-called “Red Town Hall” (Rotes Rathaus), is located in the center of the city near Alexanderplatz. It is one of Berlin's most famous landmarks and the seat of the Governing Mayor and the Senate of Berlin.The Red Town Hall is named after the color of the building’s red brick facade. It was erected between 1861 and 1869 according to the plans of architect Hermann Waesemann. Construction clearly went very smoothly: the first sitting of the magistrate in the new town hall was held as early as four years after the foundation stone was laid.The building has several wings separated by interior courtyards, and a 74-meter-high clock tower. It was heavily damaged in World War II and reconstructed after the war. As the two parts of the city drifted apart, the West Berlin members of the magistrate left the Red Town Hall and set up a new seat of municipal administration for West Berlin at the Schöneberg district town hall.In 1991, the Red Town Hall reassumed its function as seat of government for the now reunified Berlin. The Red Town Hall has several magnificent rooms. One of them, the armorial hall, was originally used by the Berlin city council. It has beautiful windows decorated with the coats of arms of Berlin and all the districts of the city. Today it is used as a recep-tion room. Another room used for special recep-tions and ceremonies is the great ceremonial hall, the largest room in the building.The column hall, nine meters high and considered the most beautiful hall of the building, used to be the library. Nowadays it is a location for exhibitions and special events.In 2008 I attended the Reminders Day Aids Gala at the Red Town Hall. The gala, under the patronage of Berlin’s Governing Mayor Klaus Wowereit, was a charity event to collect money to help HIV-positive people suffering from AIDS. Klaus Wowereit was Berlin’s mayor from 2001 to 2014; he was the first openly homosexual person to hold this office. I chose the Festival of Lights picture from 2005 in which the Red Town Hall is illuminated in red. The red ribbon is the universal symbol of awareness and support for people living with HIV. The first of December is World AIDS Day, which was started in 1988 to raise awareness, show support for those living with the condition, and remember those who have died from it. Fortunately, much has changed since the early days of HIV/AIDS. Today, thanks to advances in medicine, it’s possible to live a healthy and full life with a disease that used to be a death sentence.Therefore the sentence “Menschlicher Wille kann alles versetzen”, (the human will can move anything)” refers not only to the reunification of the Berlin government in 1991, but also to the achievements made in fighting for better treatments for HIV/AIDS.