A train station as an art object and a tourist attraction - there are only a few cities. The town of Uelzen on the edge of the Lüneburg Heath is one of them - with the Hundertwasser train station.
Since it opened 20 years ago in November 2000, the Hundertwasser train station has attracted many visitors who want to admire the beautiful train station, which was one of the last projects of the Viennese artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser, up close.
Green roofs, glass domes, dazzling colors
Curved lines and plenty of daylight through a glass roof dome give the station a friendly atmosphere.Hundertwasser redesigned the listed building according to his ideas as part of a project for the Expo 2000 world exhibition in Hanover. The result was a building that developed a special charm with its colors and shapes. Colorful columns and golden balls adorn the façade, bushes sprout on the roofs, and a photovoltaic system integrated there generates environmentally friendly electricity. Inside, imaginative mosaics and dazzling colors adorn the old station building from 1887.
There are hardly any straight lines, all corners are rounded. A glass dome allows the daylight inside and creates a friendly atmosphere. Even a visit to the station toilets becomes an artistic delight thanks to the colorful mosaics and ornaments.
A special Expo project
The station also looks inviting from the platform side.During the preparations for Expo 2000, ideas for two very different projects came up in Uelzen:the renovation of the train station and a Hundertwasser exhibition in the nearby Holdenstedt Castle. A letter to the editor suggested linking the two projects. Both Hundertwasser and Deutsche Bahn AG liked the idea, so the artist designed a model as a template for the conversion - not an easy task, because the character of the brick building from the Wilheminian period was to be retained. At the same time, the craftsmen were required to avoid all straight lines and to round off all corners. For this, valid construction standards had to be partially overridden.
Hundertwasser never saw the train station
On November 25, 2000, the redesigned station was officially inaugurated. Hundertwasser himself never saw the station. He died shortly before in February 2000 of heart failure on a boat trip from his adopted home of New Zealand to Europe.