Just think of the countless visitors who walk over Avenue des Champs-Élysées every year, stroll amazedly on Times Square or walk through the backdrop of Frankfurt’s new old town. Architecture has become a witness of the times everywhere, and you can also find properties from our portfolio. The facades of many buildings under our responsibility tell stories and shape neighbourhoods and sometimes entire cityscapes - in some cases significantly longer than our hausInvest’s own 50-year history.
But what does such a heritage that wants to be preserved mean for an asset manager? How can we secure such values in the portfolio and ideally also increase them through expertise and good ideas?
Especially in times of sustainability and circular economy, the topic of building monuments is experiencing a new kind of reading. After all, a building that has housed its residents, visitors or users for several, if not many, generations is ideally proof of the efficiency and savings potential of new building emissions. Consequently, building monuments are sponsors of what is gaining a new presence today under the concept of revitalisation of the existing or reconstruction culture.
All of this is reason enough to take a look at what benefits monuments in our portfolio offer and what challenges can come with building in existing buildings. After all, the guiding principle of active asset management is: Gentle with substance, but not hesitant with innovation.
What is actually considered a monument?
A very brief history of heritage conservation: The subject of monument protection is almost as old as the architecture itself. As often as this sentence can be read in a historical context, it also has a certain validity in this case. Early on, buildings were described as both worthy of protection and a burden of old generations. Fashion and construction styles have not always been evident and preservation has not always been linked to aesthetic conditions. Despite this very wide range, the actual monument protection - also conceptually - can be traced back to the end of the 19th century. The first attempts to systematically and legally protect architectural certificates began in the 1860s. The Dehio handbook, which later became popular, was a defining work on the topic. As a reference work for art monuments, the German architectural and art historian Georg Dehio established his Atlas as the standard. The first codified German Heritage Protection Act was enacted in 1902 in the Grand Duchy of Hesse.
In principle, monuments are a category of cultural monuments and are described as a preservable component of past construction. So far the short definition and history.
Facets and facades
Dealing with the topic of monuments and monument preservation offers many perspectives and, especially in a large portfolio of over 200 properties, countless stories could be told about individual properties. But firstly, four examples from our portfolio are intended to report on what monument protection made by Commerz Real can mean.