Despite initially considered as exaggerated and mannerist in design, the façade of Mariendom humbles visitors, with its jagged and furrowed mass, it is considered as one of the most monumental manifestations of a modern church building as a castled crystal mountain, which evoked a feeling of safety. The church is often interpreted as a tent, referring to the pilgrim's wanderings. However the architect disassociates himself from this comparison since he could have hardly chosen an emergency accommodation, such as a tent, to represent the house of God. It may have tent-like nature about it due to the addition of a multitude of folded elements and the forgoing of a waterproof covering. Bohn intended for the jagged church to fit in the landscape of the Bergische Land, not necessarily with the surrounding architecture but more with the immediate landscape that is graced by hills. Also there is a clear association with the trademark of the catholic papacy, the first pope, Peter, meaning the rock. Churches were Gottfried Böhm's preferred architectural goal. He was the same time a musician and trained sculptor. His sculptural mode of thinking is evident in many of his architectural designs.
The church holds two spaces: the outer ones is a pressed block of moderate scale fragmented into irregular walls, angles and slopes, while the inner one soars upwards into new directions with a volume perceived twice its size. This space has no ceiling and no vaults; it closes like a crystal with several ridge points at the height of thirty metres. The material he preferred over many years as building material was concrete - moulding them in such a way to transmit the idea of flight, and buoyancy. The chapel niches are formed by jointless folds of concrete, and the inside is featured with fanning bricks, street lights and façade like galleries that surround the entire space. Unfortunately, as in the case with many buildings built in experimental materials, the church suffered some issue of heating since the sand-blasted and site-poured concrete did not have any insulation of damp-proofing upon installation as the church was purposed for summer use only. The act of procession and the relationship between the space and the human body are essential in the creation of a sacred experience.
The Via Sacra at Neviges was designed from the perspective of a flexible architectural model, which was not based upon urban design ideal of the modern building as a detached sculpture but the view of people moving through space that inherently become the ultimate creators of the architecture. In regards to functional and symbolic aspects, Böhm's church recalls the topology of a pilgrimage church. A group of stairs, comprising of 15 steps (representing Mary's age at the time of Annunciation) lead to a long spatial pathway connected to a centralized church, flowing into a piazza which intensifies the physical impression of the church behind it. The piazza, a centralized space, acts as a peripheral zone of circulation where pilgrims obtain spiritual reinvigoration after undergoing catharsis along the path of repentance.
The pilgrimage church in Neviges is exceptionally complex and contradictory and described as a ''memory of another epoch… disturbing and magnificent''. A building that despite its eccentricity, does not conflict with the surrounding environment, clearly linked to its time and also deeply rooted to the traditions of the pilgrims. "As safe as the Romanesque, as elevated as the Gothic," that is how a church should be, Böhm once formulated.
GOTTFRIED BÃ-HM'S HANS OTTO THEATRE
Gottfried Böhm created interiors that seemed like exteriors and vice versa. This is the only characteristic that remained constant throughout Böhm's works, since his style was in constant flux and every structure was different from the one that preceded it. He felt that buildings must 'have meaning' which somewhat clashed with the Bauhaus decree of functionality. Despite his buildings' explosive nature, Böhm never built ostentatiously, never with the will to dominate, and when he built on a large scale, then with a smile.
His most recent creation is the Hans Otto Theatre in Potsdam. The architect sketched a 5-storey theatrical building with bowl-shaped, cantilevered roofs making use of concrete and glass. The theatres is situated on a land on the banks of Havel and the Tiefer See lake. It has been a many time associated with Jørn Utzon's opera house in Sydney because of its fantastic waterside location and shape of the buildings. The expressive architecture of the theatre evolves from the former barracks Schiffbauergasse. The shells are the most significant feature of the building, which graces its surroundings by providing Potsdam with an iconic image. What was for a long time a scabby city backyard is today a district that offers everything an architect could wish for: water, ships, imposing trees, picturesque industrial monuments, which can all be cleaned up in a wonderfully nostalgic fashion.
The roofs curve up on top of each other above the auditorium in a dynamic fashion, giving the illusion of petals from an orchid, with the fiery red colour contrasting with the surrounding old trees and reflective water surface. The lowest shell, atop the foyer creates a pleasant location of interaction with the surrounding landscape and the higher shells integrate with the theatre hall, which can be lit by daylight.
One enters the theatre through a purposely staged route at the rear of the building, leading to a dark and narrow cloak room which then throws you into a brightly-lit, fully-glazed foyer. The view on the left hand side opens out to the water and the right-hand side, if not curtained, daylight enters and illuminates the building right up to the stage. Gottfried Böhm injected flexibility in his design, as the theatre can also be used for balls and congresses. The auditorium, which holds 470 non-tiered seats, can be completely lowered at the level of the stage. Böhm's orchid is considered at the new trademark for the city, and truly creates the impression of red petals rising from the waterline to anyone that beholds it.
CONCLUSION
Peter Zumthor and Gottfried Böhm both create architecture with its own 'atmosphere', and a 'beautiful form' which focuses on the consistency of the place, use and form in the architecture. This may be considered as the phenomenological approach: the distinction between the natural and manmade, the awareness of the structure's resonance with the environment, and the ambition to land an awe-inspiring impression within the viewer. The architect calculates the body of the architecture, material compatibility, the sound of space, surrounding objects, composure and seduction of movement, tension between interior and exterior, levels of intimacy, and the projection of light.
Critics argue that "design which is purely infatuated with phenomena (for the sake of consciousness) often lacks the sufficient pragmatism necessary for the creation of coherent, efficient, and economical architecture", as seen in Zumthor's Bruder Klaus Field Chapel, which lacks plumbing and shelter, or Böhm's Neviges church which does not provide enough heating due to experimental manipulation of material.
Though these faults are evidence that this approach is so complex it sometimes grows beyond the architect's reach and asserts its own existence as something more than just a roof over someone's head. This is the reason why Peter Zumthor and Gottfried Böhm are more than academic architects. They are architects that strive to not simply surround the architecture around the human, but to infuse it within the person to the very core.