The Akademie der Künste (Academy of Arts) in Berlin has carried out its task of promoting the arts in Germany since the year it was founded in 1696. From the outset, master builders have been eligible to become members. The architect Hans Scharoun laid the groundwork for establishing the architectural archive. As the first post-war president of the academy in West Berlin, he was eager to document twentieth-century architecture in the Archive.

Besides the story lying behind the assembly of a collection, this publication presents all seventy-one archives and eighty collections, including short biographies of the originators and the nature and scope of inventories. The Preußische Akademie (Prussian Academy) is represented among other things by drawings by Friedrich Gilly from the end of the eighteenth century. Expressionist designs by Bruno Taut, Alfons Anker, Paul Goesch and Adolf Behne in particular are to be found in rich abundance. In common with the archives of Richard Ermisch, Paul Baumgarten and Thilo Schoder, these offer a chronicle of the 1920s.

One focus of the collection is devoted to the archives of Second World War émigré architects, among them Adolf Rading, Gabriel Epstein, Julius Posenerand Konrad Wachsmann. The post-war period and the booming 1960s are represented by the archives of Hermann Henselmann, Walter Rossow, Bernhard Hermkes, Werner Hebebrand, Werner Düttmann and Heinz Graffunder. Archives and collections which can be traced back beyond the turn of the twenty-first century emerged from Jörg Schlaich, Kurt Ackermann, Szyszkowitz + Kowalski and Valentien + Valentien.

On offer for the first time is an overview in print form of these archives acquired by the Academy up to the present day – archives of architects, engineers, landscape architects and architectural photographers and critics alike. This publication presents an excerpt from around half a million documents.