Heinz Graffunder

Heinz Graffunder (23 December 1926 – 9 December 1994) was a German architect.

Life

Early years Heinz Graffunder as born into a working-class family in Berlin. Like others of his generation, the final part of his schooling was accelerated due to the pressures of World War II. He was then conscripted into the German army, which led to a period as a prisoner of war. The war itself ended approximately five months after his eighteenth birthday with Berlin occupied by Soviet troops. They would remain in the eastern part of what remained of Germany for nearly five decades. On his release Graffunder undertook an apprenticeship in the building trade. After that, between 1952 and 1967, he worked as an architect and city planner. He was employed as department head with Berlin's "VEB Development Project Support" organisation ("Bauprojektbetreuung Groß-Berlin") and with its various successor entities. Heinz Graffunder, shortly before his death, discussing the state of the Palace of the Republic Between 1972 and 1973 he was chief architect in the Institute for Residential and Social Development at the East German Building Academy. After that he headed up the project cooperative and was chief architect for the Palace of the Republic, This was almost certainly the most high-profile of his projects. The building accommodated the official legislature of the German Democratic Republic. Nevertheless, following reunification, between 1990 and his death in 1994 he operated his own Architecture Bureau in Berlin. Commissions included two garden centres, several hotel developments and urban development projects. After reunification the tenants had moved out and the empty building had fallen into disrepair, which is why it had been demolished.