House at Marienstrasse 16

About the building

At the corner of Marienstrasse and Luisenstrasse in Kirchenfeld stands a house that catches the eye at once from the south and from the east. The heritage office praises how originally and effectively the corner is handled here, especially since the turret was added. The house was designed and built in 1889 by the architect Eduard von Rodt, who was also the client.

Von Rodt (1849–1926) was an architect and historian. He trained under Gottlieb Hebler and as a stonemason in the minster workshop, studied at the Polytechnic in Stuttgart in 1869/70 and worked as an architect in Bern from 1872. His buildings include the federal arms factory and the wing extensions of the city library. From 1881 to 1894 he directed the Historical Museum and, with Adolf Tièche, carried out the new building of the Bern Historical Museum. In Kirchenfeld he had bought building land from the Berne Land Company and put up several houses there.

The house is a half-timbered building on a roughly rectangular plan under a hipped roof. The ground floor is smoothly rendered, the upper floor banded, and the openings have sandstone frames. A corner tower on a square plan is partly built into the main block. Via a low hip with corner gussets it turns into a small octagonal turret room under a squat spire.

In 1914 a director named Gyger had the house enlarged by F. Brechbühler. The building history on the inventory sheet calls this a veranda superstructure, while the title of the same sheet speaks of a turret superstructure. In 1990 the façades and roof were repaired and the entrance with its porch renovated. The house is worthy of protection, has been secured by a protection agreement since 1990 and belongs to the Kirchenfeld building group.

Researched and summarised by Bärn Kit. Sources: Bauinventar der Stadt Bern: Marienstrasse 16 · Wikidata: Q106614773 · Wikipedia (de): Eduard von Rodt · Bauinventar der Stadt Bern: Baugruppe Kirchenfeld