Steel Church (Pressa 1928)

From May to October 1928 the Pressa drew some 1,500 exhibitors from 43 countries to Cologne-Deutz, onto grounds that had opened just four years earlier. The event prompted numerous new and partly trend-setting buildings – among them the Cologne trade-fair tower and the Steel Church. Otto Bartning, already experienced in church design, was asked to create an exhibition building that could later be rebuilt elsewhere. He designed a hall church on a parabolic ground plan, with a raised chancel in the curve and a projecting twin-tower block in front. Dedicated on 31 May 1928 and often simply called the "Pressa Church" in contemporary writing, it served as an exhibition space for the Protestant press.

The building was assembled on site in Cologne from pre-produced steel parts, including steel girders around 20 metres tall, clad on the outside with copper. Between the supports the builders set more than 600 lead-glazed window panels reaching the full height of the space, designed by the stained-glass artist Elisabeth Coester. The organ came from W. Sauer of Frankfurt (Oder) and the bells from Franz Schilling & Söhne in Apolda. Hans Wissel, then a professor at the Cologne Werkschulen, created a larger-than-life expressionist crucifix as well as the altar and pulpit; the pulpit bore the symbols of the four Evangelists – a man or angel for Matthew, a lion for Mark, an ox for Luke and an eagle for John.

Alongside Erich Mendelsohn's pavilion for the Rudolf Mosse publishing house, the Steel Church was regarded in architectural circles as a highlight of the entire Pressa and made Bartning known worldwide. After the exhibition it was dismantled and handed over free of charge to the parish of Essen-West. It was rebuilt in Essen-Holsterhausen and dedicated on 22 March 1931 as the Melanchthon Church, named after the reformer Philipp Melanchthon. Under the influence of the German Christians the parish distanced itself from the expressionist style from 1935 on, and the figure of the altar cross was removed in December 1935. On 9 March 1942 the building was devastatingly struck by incendiary bombs as the first church in Essen to be hit, burned out and was later scrapped.

The former Pressa grounds in Deutz are now covered by the Rheinpark – of the Steel Church itself nothing can be found there. Its architectural echo, however, still resonates in the city: the Christ Church in the Belgian Quarter was built in 1951 as a plain steel structure modelled on the Steel Church, keeping Bartning's Cologne idea visible in the cityscape.