Construction at the northern entrance to Westend Campus remains on schedule
Almost exactly one year after the official groundbreaking, Goethe University Frankfurt is celebrating the topping-out ceremony of the future Center for Humanities on its Westend Campus. A unique aspect of the project is that the university is managing the construction of the new building independently.
Spanning 2,800 square meters, a total of seven floors, 180 office workspaces, four seminar rooms, a rehearsal stage, and a large multipurpose room — all this will be part of the future Center for Humanities when it opens in 2026. It will offer ample space for innovative and forward-thinking research projects, many of which are funded through third-party grants. The building is prominently located on Westend Campus – right next to the building for Linguistics and Cultural Studies, completed in 2022, and the Leibniz Institute for Research and Information in Education (DIPF). Situated at the corner of Miquelallee and Hansaallee, the Center for Humanities will become a visible element of Goethe University’s campus skyline. Now that the shell structure is complete and the roof closed, the official topping-out ceremony was held today.
“I’m thrilled by the impressive progress of the construction works – which serves as a strong impulse for the building’s future use by third-party funded research projects,” Goethe University President Prof. Enrico Schleiff said at the ceremony. “So far, the Center for Humanities project has remained within both time and budget. Everyone involved has contributed outstanding work. My sincere thanks go to all the trades involved, from planning to execution. The dedication of those working on the building is literally reflected in the structure itself.”
This is the first building for which Goethe University has assumed full responsibility for both planning and financing. The design was created by Esref Yavuz, Head of the university’s Planning and Construction Department, who took into account a wide range of needs. The building will be accessible at ground level from both the east and west, leading into a spacious foyer with a view of a two-story, glassed-in space that can be used for exhibitions and events. On the other side of the foyer is the rehearsal stage, extending from the basement to the ground floor and also visible from outside. The stage is available for rehearsals and performances by students from the Department of Theater, Film and Media Studies and may also be used by the university’s orchestra and its media technology team. “I’m excited at the prospect of being able to watch rehearsals from the outside soon,” says Stephanie Köhler-Frank, the external architect managing the project. Köhler-Frank visits the construction site once or twice a week to monitor progress and consult with site management. Her planning meetings benefit from her hands-on experience with university-specific usage, which comes in handy given the multitude of decisions that must be made.
The ground floor of the Center for Humanities also includes a seminar room and an office. Three additional seminar rooms are located on the first floor, along with learning spaces for students. Floors two through five will house around 180 office workstations, primarily for third-party funded projects – some in individual offices, others in shared spaces. The implementation planning has been entrusted to the architectural firm ArGe Architekten. The overall cost is estimated at around €20 million.
“The Center for Humanities will serve as a ‘showcase’ for research, teaching, and the arts –open to all Goethe University faculties. With this building, the university is enhancing its humanities and social sciences campus in Westend, while at the same time taking another significant step towards relocating its Bockenheim campus facilities to the Westend and Riedberg campuses. As the state government, we support this strategic restructuring and have already invested over €1 billion from the HEUREKA university construction investment program. We trust the expertise of the university’s own construction office and have therefore delegated project-specific ownership for this building to it, allowing the university to independently execute the project,” explained Timon Gremmels, Hessian Minister for Higher Education, Research, the Arts and Culture.
