Kieselgebäude (1920ies Shopping Mall)
The Kieselgebäude is a building in the district Elisabethvorstadt in Salzburg. It was built in 1924 by an architect with the wonderful name of Wunibald Deininger, a student of Otto Wagner. The latter was one of Austria′s most important Art Nouveau and modern architects. The Kieselgebäude was originally the headquarter of a publishing company; since the late 1980ies, it is a shopping mall. The building is considered to be among the most important ones of modern architecture in Western Austria.
Back in the 1920ies, the Elisabeth Vorstadt district was a stronghold of the social democrats, mainly due to the high numbers of railway workers that lived here, often in communal houses. The Kieselgebäude housed quite appropriately a publishing company of the same name which produced papers and magazines for the social democrats and communist parties. In the 1950ies, the Kiesel publishing company became one of the biggest print corporations in Austria. The success was not lasting too long, though, and in the mid-1970ies, Kiesel went bust.
In the 1980ies, the building was re-modelled; only the façade was preserved. In 1989, after another round of renovations, it was adapted into a shopping centre with office space. The characteristic features of the Kieselgebäude, however, remain to be those from the original 1920ies building: Reliefs by Hans Pontiller and Roland Bohner that were completed in 1926.
Further Reading
http://www.salzburg.com/wiki/index.php/Kieselgeb%C3%A4ude
SalzburgWiki on the Kieselgebäude
