![]() ![]() “Most of the 20 or so paternosters that are still running in Hamburg are no longer in their original condition. It is a particularly beautiful paternoster and unique in Germany in terms of its design,” says Augenstein, whose doctoral thesis addresses the heritage value of old lifts. Now it is being restored to its former glory. Thanks to the research of art historian Robin Augenstein, an old paternoster was rediscovered in a Hamburg commercial building. ![]() Patric Wagner, Managing Director of Imbora Aufzugsdienst, stands in the machine room of what is probably the world's oldest paternoster in the Flüggerhaus. They are made of stained mahogany, which was also used for the access frames on each floor. These form the basis of the system that consists of two thick chains that run parallel up to the top floor.įourteen cabins are suspended from them, each able to fit two people. It runs on electricity that powers 10 gear wheels made of solid cast steel, one of them a good 1.5m high. They agreed to revive the paternoster and give what is thought to be the world’s oldest original circulating passenger lift a whole new lease of life. They grabbed torches and headed down to the basement where they found cogwheels, quaint mechanics that showed the six-storey building was home to a relic of elevator culture. ![]() He persuaded the building’s tenant and the Office for the Protection of Historical Monuments to join him in further investigations. Most paternosters have since been superseded by more modern lifts in the interests of safety, so Augenstein, 28, knew he had stumbled across something special. The lifts were invented in London in 1875 but Hamburg was once a paternoster pioneer, with more than 100 in action at around 1900. Robin Augenstein (left) and Patric Wagner in the world’s oldest paternoster elevator in the Fluggerhaus building in Hamburg harbour, Germany. The lifts are named after the “Our Father” prayer, referring to the string of prayer beads that also glides steadily without stopping in the hands of the faithful. People, assuming they are sufficiently agile, step into the moving compartment as it passes their floor, then step off when they reach their destination. He then discovered that the structure in the heart of the northern German city’s harbour was home to an aged paternoster that had been boarded up, hidden from the world and forgotten for more than four decades.Ī paternoster is a slow elevator that moves continuously, with a loop of open-fronted cabins that run the height of a building. While doing some research, Robin Augenstein came across an old blueprint of Hamburg’s Fluggerhaus, a historical office building with Art Nouveau touches that dates back to 1908. A young art historian accidentally discovered what is likely the world’s oldest paternoster elevator in what felt like an Indiana Jones moment. ![]()
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