International Building Exhibition Emscher Park

“The IBA Emscher Park, held at the centre of Germany’s largest industrial region, tried to find a way to transform a unique region that had been permanently marked and marred by industrial history and open up a new future for it, all within the space of ten years.“ The international building exhibitions held in Germany since the beginning of the 20th century have presented exemplary architectural and urban planning projects to an interested public. The Emscher Park International Building Exhibition (IBA Emscher Park) was held in the Ruhr area over a ten-year period from 1989 to 1999 and changed the face of the region. 19 cities and municipalities and a range of initiatives and companies planned and implemented over 100 projects of varying sizes. Some of these projects enjoyed popular appeal in the media and still stand today as examples of successful structural change achieved in the public interest, while others were “quieter” and affected their environment through smaller interventions. This book documents the IBA Emscher Park projects, presenting their evolution since 1999 as well as their current development status using images, maps and texts.