One of the mysteries of place is that the more one becomes familiar with a physical location, the more the trend is towards a failure to spot evolutionary changes in the environment as they occur. Perhaps it is a shift from the physical to the emotional: the emotional bond grows, almost as if an imagined world takes root and establishes itself, gradually growing, thereby edging out the things that are actually occurring all around us.
A return to a place after a time during which this bond may have wilted somewhat, or at least had to retreat somewhat, can often result in a shock to the system when a familiar building or spot has been transformed by construction.
Or destruction: inevitably buildings are re-built, or removed entirely - perhaps because they have gone out of style, they have become practical, or empty, or perhaps simply because someone has had a better idea of something to fill the space with.
The old post office close to the main train station in Mannheim was such a case: a massive, concrete, brutalist distribution factory which perhaps not without reason was well-placed next to the bustling commuter halls. And which has now given way to flats and shops, perfectly placed for the same commuters streaming out of the station and now with a place to go within a short stumble of the platforms.
Will it be missed? Who knows, but the concrete patterns and forms were rather symbolic of the time it was conceived in (1970s / 1980s): the post-office-yellow, of course, but also the angles, shapes, patterns which were meant to detract from the practical and utilitarian construct but probably ended up emphasising it even further, in the way that too much make up might simply lead to making a prominent nose or pair of eyes even more dominant. It may have been a bit of an eyesore for some, but it was as much a feature of the area around the train station as the cavernous entrance itself, and smelt of 1970s optimism.
The picture below, however, is not from Mannheim, but from Heidelberg. Another post office building that was being torn down, with a design from the same era (and architect: Otto Herbert Hajek) as its sibling some 30 kilometers away. One in walking distance from the Neckar, the other a similar distance from the Rhein: both have outlived their designated useful life, with their shapes and forms consigned to images and historical footnotes.
Heidelberg 2018 : 204/365