Berne Park

The Berne Park in Bottrop is a very special industrial monument: sewage has been cleared for almost forty years. Then the plant with the two circular basins and the machine house was shut down and almost fell into oblivion, until the Emschergenossenschaft decided the revitalization as place of the industrial culture.

The EMSCHERKUNST.2010, the largest art project of the European Capital of Culture 2010, created a park that was open to the public from the former, inaccessible wastewater treatment plant. The internationally renowned landscape artists Piet Oudolf and Eelco Hooftman created this fairytale park. They transformed one of the clarifiers into a sunken garden and transformed the walk-in pool into a green amphitheater with 21,000 perennials and grasses.

On the Emscher Island, directly on the Emscher Cycle Route, between Gasometer Oberhausen and Nordsternpark Gelsenkirchen, a combination of art, culture, tourism and local economy has emerged.

Here, visitors to the "Restaurant im Maschinenhaus" receive not only an event gastronomy with conference facilities, but also the nationwide unique and unusual "Park Hotel" by the Austrian artist Andreas Strauss. Five sewer pipes converted into suites await adventurous guests. And in the "tube" is not lacking in sleeping comfort: With three meters in length and a diameter of 2.40 meters you can even stand in it. A special highlight of the overnight experience is the view through the porthole into the sky above the Ruhr area.

The Parkhotel or the most unusual hostel in the Pott! The concrete pipe as an alternative to a tent, inn or youth hostel? Five concrete pipes were waiting for their revival on the Emscher Island and their new purpose. And Andreas Strauss put the tubes in scene. He succeeded in transforming the tubes three meters long and 2.40 meters in diameter into an unusual and sought-after hostel.

The Berne Park looks cool, but in the summer the "smells" are already heavy with the Emscher.