The new official headquarters at the Spreebogen has been completed in Berlin. The six-storey office building in timber-hybrid construction will initially serve over the coming years as temporary accommodation for the Office of the Federal President, before subsequently providing space for other federal authorities. The project was delivered by Kaufmann Bausysteme together with developer PRIMUS developments and the architectural practice sauerbruch hutton.
Across a total floor area of 18,700 square metres, the new building provides space for 179 offices as well as flexible event areas. The structure combines 382 prefabricated timber modules with load-bearing building cores and plinth structures made of reinforced concrete. The top floor was executed as a timber element construction to provide greater clear heights and wide spans for meeting rooms.
Prefabrication shortens construction time to twenty months
The construction period totalled twenty months, remaining on track within the budget of 205 million EUR. Instrumental in the swift delivery was the parallel execution: while civil engineering works and reinforced concrete cores were being constructed on site, Kaufmann Bausysteme prefabricated up to ten room modules daily in its factory in Berlin-Herzfelde, sheltered from weather conditions. These were delivered by lorry and assembled immediately. In terms of energy performance, the building conforms to the Federal Efficiency Building 40 standard and uses district heating alongside photovoltaics.
Should spatial requirements change, the modules can be flexibly connected into team offices or partitioned. Architect Jürgen Bartenschlag of sauerbruch hutton notes that each load-bearing structure is deployed where it can leverage its specific strengths. Inside, exposed timber surfaces and coloured cladding conceal the modular joints. Managing director Christian Kaufmann points to resource conservation and cost management through serial processes in major public sector developments.
Growth and nationwide modular construction projects
The family-owned enterprise based in Reuthe in the Bregenzerwald anticipates record turnover of 330 million EUR for the 2026 financial year and is currently preparing or executing several large-scale projects across Germany:
- —Berlin school construction campaign: Up to ten modular timber compartment schools with 300 modules each, including a project at Bisamstrasse-Landsberger Strasse that has already commenced operations.
- —Ville Campus Erftstadt: Construction of 530 apartments in modular timber design as well as a timber-hybrid building for seminars in North Rhine-Westphalia by mid-2027.
- —Student accommodation in Bavaria: Completion of a complex with 151 modules in Eichstätt as well as a student residence with 450 modules in Regensburg.
With the handover of the Spreebogen complex in the summer of 2026, serial system building demonstrates its performance capability for demanding public-sector property.
