German architect Jakob Tigges has unveiled a plan for a 1,000m tall faux mountain at the site of the former Tempelhof airport in Berlin, and his supporters are taking it rather seriously. Dubbed “The Berg,” the snow-capped colossus would be the world’s largest man-made mountain and would serve as a tourist attraction for skiers from September - March offering the perfect skiing climate in the otherwise slope-less city. I am ALL about adding green space to urban environments, but devoting an enormous amount of time, energy and resources into a gigantic landmass that isn’t even inhabitable on the inside seems like a huge mound of you-know-what, if you ask me...
Plans for The Berg seem to have spawned out of a severe case of “peakis-envy”. Says Tigges in his manifesto “While big and wealthy cities in many parts of the world challenge the limits of possibility by building gigantic hotels with fancy shapes, erecting sky-high office towers or constructing hovering philharmonic temples, Berlin sets up a decent mountain… Hamburg, as stiff as flat, turns green with envy, rich and once proud Munich starts to feel ashamed of its distant Alp-panorama and planners of the Middle-East, experienced in taking the spell off any kind of architectural utopia immediately design authentic copies of the iconic Berlin-Mountain.”
Manmade Mountain Towers Over Berlin!
