Text: Otl Aicher, Jürgen W. Braun, Siegfried Gronert
Photos: Timm Rautert
Published in 1987 by: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne

When we knocked on Otl Aicher’s door in Rotis in 1985, he started off by sending us home again. We were to take time for reflection on what we had been doing in Brakel for the last century. When, after several months of reflection, FSB communicated to Otl Aicher that its activities, creating artefacts for the human hand, had actually remained unchanged since 1881, he was satisfied. He agreed to make an appointment with the Eastern Westphalians to visit their facility in the Nethegau region.

In June 1986, Otl Aicher not only toured the production facility in Brakel, he also wanted to meet the previous generation of owners and employees. So a meeting with the aged Johannes Potente was arranged, during which they discussed for a solid hour this man’s chaser’s apprenticeship, his temporary sojourn at the technical university of Pforzheim in 1933 and his favourite pastimes. Then Aicher questioned the management about what was planned for the next two or three years.

The new Managing Director proudly reported that the company was planning to hold the world’s first door handle workshop with the world’s most famous designers and architects, and that right here in the Weser Hills. Aicher asked for details, and when he heard names such as Hans Hollein, Peter Eisenman, Mario Botta and Alessandro Mendini, shook his head. He wanted to have nothing to do with such post-modern activities. He strongly advised against holding this event. Unfortunately, or rather fortunately, the preparations had already reached a stage where FSB was no longer able to cancel the project.

Interestingly enough, Otl Aicher was not the only person to show this kind of scepticism. The previous generation of Weser Hills door-handle makers also had considerable doubts about such activities of "young savages". The FSB shareholders expressed their disapproval, and some old hands talked about megalomania. Rumours circulated in Brakel that this enterprise with a great tradition was heading for a great flop.

However, the outcome was different. The first handle workshop became a global media event. The town of Brakel, called “nowhere” by Peter Eisenman, became a well-known, respected destination for the great world of design overnight. Apparently, even Otl Aicher finally bowed to this marketing success. He suggested that it should be recorded in a separate volume of the FSB Edition. What FSB had no way of knowing at the time: Aicher had already started to formulate the expressions of criticism in his mind by which he meant to censure this detested event.