In 1969, the administrative board of Deutschlandfunk decided to build Gerhard Weber's preliminary design. Weber used a suspended structure borrowed from bridge construction for the tower of the building. When construction began in 1974, a cantilever structure was mounted on a 100 metres high reinforced concrete core, from which the individual floors were lowered floor by floor. The steel cables from which the individual floors hang are inserted into the concrete beams that run diagonally across the roof of the building. The interior was state-of-the-art with studios, editing rooms and broadcasting technology. With their excellent acoustics, the broadcasting hall and chamber music hall were in line with the highly acclaimed theaters built by Weber, such as the Mannheim National Theatre and the Hamburg State Opera.[3]
The building is located in the Raderthal district of Cologne on the left bank of the Rhine and has housed the studios and editorial offices of Deutschlandfunk since February 18, 1979 (official opening: April 24, 1980). In the immediate vicinity of the tower used to be the radio building on the Raderberggürtel of Deutsche Welle; it was completely dismantled by 2021.[4]
Since January 29, 2024, the Deutschlandfunk high-rise has been a listed building.[5] A renovation strategy for the tower which will cost €300,000,000 has been created in June 2024.[6]
