Leseprobe

128 Loss and Memory Dr Siegmund Salzburg’s father, Adolph Salzburg, died in 1909. The latter’s villa at Tiergartenstrasse 8 was then sold to Carl and Felicia Glückmann, whose daughter, Elsa, Dr Siegmund Salzburg had married in 1903. Following the sale, in June 1910, the physician purchased the villa at Mozartstrasse 3 as a home for his family. Before moving into their new home, Elsa and Dr Siegmund Salzburg had lived on Prager Strasse in Dresden’s city centre with their three daughters, Thekla, Erika, and Liselotte (born 1905, 1906, and 1910). Dr Siegmund Salzburg’s younger brother was the lawyer Dr Friedrich Salzburg. Acting on behalf of his mother- in-law, Anna Gerstle (officially the building devel- oper), Dr Friedrich Salzburg commissioned the construction of the villa at Tiergartenstrasse 50. Once completed, Dr Friedrich Salzburg and his family moved into the property between late De- cember 1911 and New Year 1912. Before being purchased by Dr Siegmund Salzburg, the villa at Mozartstrasse 3 had seen four consecu- tive owners. The first of these (from 1889) was the original building developer, an accountant from the then-distinct settlement of Striesen (long since a neighbourhood of Dresden). The Dresden archi- tect J. A. Seifert was commissioned to design and oversee the construction of the villa. However, Sei­ fert withdrew his signature from the contract after just a few months, leaving the project to be com- pleted in 1891 by its new owner, a plasterer who had acquired the building in a foreclosure auction. The property exchanged hands once again in 1897 after it was purchased by a widow who was then the sole occupier of the house for about ten years. The property was owned briefly in 1909 by the busi- nessman Fritz Heller, who had a three-flight inter- nal staircase added to the central hall. The build- ing’s two floors had previously been divided into two separate living areas, linked solely by the stair- case tower on the building’s northeastern corner. Decked with a tapered roof, the tower lent a fitting- ly picturesque note to the villa’s overall appear- ance. Fritz Heller also commissioned a builder by the name of Wunderlich to arrange the relocation of the kitchen from the basement to the first floor. After purchasing the villa in June 1910, however, Dr Siegmund Salzburg had the kitchen and pantry moved to the ground floor of the stair tower. The staircase was removed and the northern and east- ern sides of the tower were expanded. The conver- sion and extension work at Mozartstrasse 3 was overseen by the architect Heinrich Watzlawick, who was also responsible for the construction, in 1901, of a notable Jugendstil villa that can still be seen today in Dresden’s Blasewitz neighbourhood.1 Site plan for planning permission for the con- struction of the villa at Mozartstrasse 3, 1889. The top of the plan points south. Villa Salzburg ap- pears at the lower right. Acquisition and Conversion of the Villa at Mozartstrasse 3