Germany: Tension of formality and informality in Berlin’s allotments
The history and challenges of Berlin’s allotment gardens amidst urban change
By Silvia Ruzzi
Meer
17 November 2025
Excerpt:
Thus, from the outset, Berlin’s allotments were born from a dual impulse: official city planning seeking to incorporate green spaces and the informal, urgent need for housing among Berlin’s rapidly growing and often impoverished population. This dual original point—formal planning meeting and informal necessity—is further underscored by the very language used to describe these spaces, ‘colonies.’ Indeed, the beginnings of Berlin’s allotment history also correspond to the era of German colonialism in Africa, between 1884 and 1920, a period referenced in the still current naming of the gardens as ‘colonies.’
Such naming alludes to a center-periphery relation, as Hilbrandt observes, pointing to an understanding of the allotments as ‘the periphery of the “civilized” city’ (Hilbrandt, 2021, p. 36). Indeed, despite being within the city’s boundaries, the allotments are often situated in marginal locations.
The term ‘colony,’ therefore, becomes a potent symbol of this inherent paradox. It suggests a formalized, structured space—a ‘colony’ within the city—yet simultaneously evokes ideas of distance, periphery, and a relationship to a ‘center’ that is conceptually elsewhere, more ‘civilized,’ more truly ‘urban.’ This very naming reveals the ambiguous position of allotments from their inception—formally recognized, yet conceptually and geographically on the margins.
Read the complete article here.
Source: https://cityfarmer.info/germany-tension-of-formality-and-informality-in-berlins-allotments/
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