How do we want to live? with Danuta Schmidt and Florentine Anders

Danuta Schmidt in conversation with journalist Florentine Anders about her biographical book “Die Allee” (The Avenue), her grandfather Hermann Henselmann, and the extended family of the GDR's most famous architect and head of the Berlin Building Academy.

From the GDR's early years until the 1970s, Henselmann designed, among other things, residential buildings, cultural centers in cities and rural areas, housing estates, and modern high-rises such as the Weberwiese high-rise, the University Tower in Leipzig, and the well-known JenTower in Jena. His signature style is primarily associated with Stalinallee (today's Karl-Marx-Allee). The spherical shape of the TV Tower, Germany's tallest structure, is also his design. Socialist Classicism, Wedding Cake Style, Postmodernism, East German Modernism? The conversation focuses less on classifications or interpretations and more on the valuable cultural heritage that Henselmann and his contemporaries left to Germany.

Florentine Anders is the granddaughter of the Henselmanns. She studied in Leipzig and Paris, graduated from the Centre de Formation des Journalistes (Centre de Formation des Journalistes) in Paris, and worked as a freelance journalist in France and Germany. She wrote for various newspapers and is now an editor at Studio ZX, a subsidiary of Zeit Verlag. Since 2022, she has been a board member of the Hermann Henselmann Foundation. "The Avenue" is her debut novel.

Danuta Schmidt is a journalist and moderator. With the Berlin-based "SonntagsLese" (Sunday Reading), she developed her own discussion format over 15 years. After a semester of journalism in Leipzig during the period of German reunification, she switched to architecture, working in various firms while simultaneously continuing her journalistic development at several daily newspapers, later at MDR radio, and at RBB television. She has worked freelance since 2010.


Danuta Schmidt is a journalist and moderator. Registration is required: Please call (030) 54 704 142 or email Benita Hanke.

Admission is free; a donation to the Friends of the Marzahn-Hellersdorf City Library (Förderverein Stadtbibliothek Marzahn-Hellersdorf e.V.) to help fund events is suggested.

Starts at 8:00 p.m.

Doors open at 7:30 p.m.