THE UNDERGROUND
The Underground reimagines the park pavilion as an intimate beer garden, embedding social life within the landscape rather than simply placing a bar in it. A glowing roof band, slender columns, and fluted planters frame a room without walls, where linear heaters and counters wrap the edges and invite people to pause, lean, and stay. Perched between path and river, the pavilion reads as a lantern and threshold in the trees, quietly extending the life of the park into the evening while turning everyday circulation into a shared civic ritual. Softened by planting and light, it dissolves boundary into atmosphere and settles as a quiet civic room, nearby.
Location: Berlin, Germany
Year: 2026
Year: 2026
The Park Pavilion
The Underground is organized as a simple, legible pavilion that uses a single bar volume to anchor a generous outdoor room. The plan aligns with existing park paths, allowing visitors to drift naturally past and into the space, while planted perimeter bands create a soft threshold between gravel courts and surrounding woodland. Fluted cladding, integrated planters, and a continuous counter define the edge condition, giving guests multiple ways to occupy the bar—from standing and leaning to seated, outward-facing views toward the river. Services are consolidated into a compact core, keeping the perimeter clear for circulation and maximizing the bar’s length, visibility, and operational efficiency during peak hours.
At the scale of the park, the pavilion acts as a small but precise piece of infrastructure—durable, easily maintained, and adaptable to different programming throughout the seasons. The circular roof band and slim column grid provide a calm structural rhythm that can accommodate heaters, lighting, and signage without visual clutter, allowing the glowing soffit to register as a continuous line in the landscape. Daylight filters through the open sides, while at night the warm linear lighting softly washes the ground and planters, extending the safe, active edge of the park without overwhelming it. This combination of robust detailing, modest footprint, and clear spatial hierarchy allows The Underground to operate simultaneously as everyday neighborhood bar, event venue, and civic lantern, capable of evolving with future uses while remaining a quiet, enduring presence in the park.
