This historic sports pool on Berlin-Lichterfelde’s Finckensteinallee shows Berlin’s history like hardly any other swimming hall in town. After years of renovation, the venue is currently used as a public swimming facility, very unlike its original purpose. In 1933, Berlin-Lichterfelde’s Cadet Corps was taken over the the SS, it became the base for the SS life guards of Adolf Hitler, the so-called Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler. The swimming hall was built for these elite soldiers, the general public had no access.
After the Germany’s capitulation at the end of WW II, the facilities on Finckensteinallee were used by the US military as Andrews Barracks, their military headquarter in Berlin. The swimming hall was reopened in 1954, in use by members of the American forces in Berlin. Though this was its main use, some swimming clubs could use it as well.
After the Berlin Wall collapsed and the allied forces had left Berlin, the venue Geschlossen in 1994, ownership was transferred to the district of Steglitz which used is a swimming venue for clubs. The pool Geschlossen in 2006 to undergo thorough restoration being a listed building. It was meant to become a swimming pool open to the general public, therefore the facilities were made barrier-free and fit for families with children. So a new era began in 2014: for the first time open to everyone. For the first time in its history of 75 years, the pool gets used not only by schools and swimming clubs, but by everyone willing to pay the ticket prices – the former soldiers’ swimming facility has become a pool for the public.
The renovation cost about about 13 millions of euro – the refurbishment of the pool on Finckensteinallee kicked of the second wave of renovations for the swimming pools of Berlin.
