Pears Jewish Campus

Paxton10 Helps Create Safe Yet Welcoming Education & Culture Complex in Berlin

Pears Jewish Campus is a seven-storey education and culture complex that covers over 80,000 square feet, in Westfälische Strasse, Berlin. The building was designed by renowned architectural firm Tchoban Voss and constructed over a five-year period. The €43.7 million project was funded by numerous private donations, the German Federal Government, and UK-based Pears Foundation.

It is the largest Jewish campus in Europe, encompassing a kindergarten, primary, and secondary school, a cinema, sports and events halls, art and music studios, co-working office spaces, as well as a kosher restaurant.

Paxton’s latest system Paxton10 has been installed to secure the building with sophisticated access control, remote-site management, and flexible access permissions.

Requirements

Security is of the utmost importance for the safety and protection of young students, teachers and professionals working within the campus, given the anti-Semitic incidents. This prompted the development of a comprehensive security concept with enhanced capabilities, including the need for full-lockdown functionality and checkpoints with weapon detection.

Due to the increased level of security needed, Peter Gräf, Managing Director of GRAEF Systemtechnik GmbH, was contracted to oversee the installation and technical aspects of the new security system. Systemtechnik are a group of companies with an arm that specialises in securing high-footfall public sector buildings.

Peter established that this was a project far beyond the normal requirements. He explains: “Every security measure on the campus had to be designed to recognise and ward off potential threats at an early stage and create a safe yet welcoming environment.

“The system also needs the ability to convert into manual operation and shut down all electronic keypads from sunset on Fridays to sunset on Saturdays for Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest.”

For ease of use, the campus managers need web-based remote site management software and a straightforward way to connect across multiple buildings in various locations.

Peter continues: “It is a large site and running cables across it would be a challenge. Having a system that links wirelessly is the simplest and most cost-effective solution.

“Additionally, there are many people requiring varying levels of access permissions throughout the week. Therefore, it is especially important to be able to implement simple measures to allow access to certain areas at certain times by using electronic tokens that can be issued remotely.”

All these requirements coincide with the fact that the system needs long-term scalability, and the design of the hardware used had to meet the expectations of award-winning German architect and artist Sergei Tchoban, who designed the building.