Work in progress | schmidinger möbelbau has been commissioned with the complete furnishing of St. Hedwig’s Cathedral in Berlin.

The commission includes a considerable number of sacral furniture pieces, including over 700 church chairs and children’s stools, large and smaller display cases (among them those for the famous Neapolitan nativity scene and historic relic figures), as well as offering tables, credenzas, donation boxes, a candle ring, and central liturgical objects such as altar and ambo for the lower church, all of which will be delivered to Berlin in October 2024.

The furniture is being built in the workshop of schmidinger möbelbau and by partner companies specializing in metal, glass, upholstery, and wood in the Bregenzerwald, using various materials and based on designs by Leo Zogmayer.

Eight years ago, schmidinger möbelbau already delivered prototypes for the prestigious project in Berlin. Nearly 170 architecture offices participated in the competition for the redesign of the cathedral. The design of Sichau & Walter Architekten BDA in cooperation with Austrian artist Leo Zogmayer was chosen by the jury. A major advantage in the competition for schmidinger möbelbau was their meanwhile considerable reference list of sacral furniture.

St. Hedwig’s Cathedral: From the Pantheon to a 21st-Century Cathedral
St. Hedwig’s Cathedral is the first Catholic church that was allowed to be built in the royal residence city of Frederick the Great after the Reformation. The central structure, inspired by the Roman Pantheon, was designed by Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff and constructed under the supervision of Johann Boumann the Elder until 1773, directly at the Forum Fridericianum, now known as Bebelplatz. During the reconstruction of the cathedral after World War II, even before the Berlin Wall was erected, the diocese commissioned the Düsseldorf architect Hans Schwippert to restore the interior.