Gläserne Manufaktur

Dresden, Germany

Photo © HG Esch

Photo © Knut O. Laubner

Architects: HENN

Location: Lennéstraße 1, 01099 Dresden, Germany
Year: 2001
Client: Volkswagen
Area GFA: 81 600 m²

With its Gläserne Manufaktur, Volkswagen became the first manufacturer to realise a production concept linking processes of classical industrial automobile production and fine craftsmanship: the result is the VW luxury class limo Phaeton manufactured in handwork. Gläserne Manufaktur is a place of transparency and dialogue and makes the experience of automotive production visible to the outside. In Gläserne Manufaktur, themes of and related to the automobile are presented – events range from art exhibitions and music concerts to television talk shows. The clearly delineated and comprehensible areas are defined with few materials, glass, aluminium, maple, bog oak, cherry tree, granite. The available space and the material composition of the building allow a new quality of customer service: spatial experience of the automobile and spatial experience of architecture flow naturally into each other.