Once again, the business deal fell through.
For the past ten years, the Stadtentwicklungs- und Wirtschaftsförderungsgesellschaft mbH Oberursel (SEWO) has been trying to sell the Officers’ Club (aka as Mountain Lodge) without success. The original asking price of € 1.5 million has come down to € 900.000, but petitions and restrictions from the surrounding neighbors make the sale difficult, if not downright impossible.
The building, erected in 1938, served as the Officers’ Club from 1945 until 1993.
The last potential buyer was going to run an office on the first floor, possible rent out two spacious apartment under the roof, as well letting our historian Manfred Kopp keep his Camp King archives in the basement.
Now it is official as yesterday’s e-mail from SEWO confirmed – the house is on the market once more and the search for another location to house the Camp King documents is on.
In October 2009, the Frankfurter Rundschau had published an interesting article Büros in der alten Wiskeybar.
To read more about this project, read my previous Camp King posts.
During the construction boom in the late 1990s, this important building was overlooked. Call it negligence or ignorance, but had a specific land-use type for this building been added BEFORE the sale of the surrounding houses, the Officers’ Club would have had a caretaker by now. Instead of being idle inventory, Oberursel could have added this as a historical monument to its portfolio.
I am afraid the tower clock will read 12:15 for many years to come.
Note: U.S. Americans refer to the building as the Officers’ Club, whereas most Germans call it the Mountain Lodge.