Leberecht Migge (1881–1935 · garden architect)

Considered one of the most important garden architects of the 20th century, Migge was born in Gdansk in 1881. After taking an apprenticeship in horticulture, from 1904 he worked as artistic director of a large Hamburg landscaping company. From 1913 he committed himself to kitchen gardens and acted as a pioneer of social and nature-oriented garden design. Migge published several books, was a member of the craftsmen's association Deutscher Werkbund and editor of the newspaper Siedlungswirtschaft. After spending several years in the artists' colony Worpswede near Bremen, he moved to Berlin, where he worked as an independent landscape architect in close collaboration with Martin Wagner and Bruno Taut, among others. In addition to the Horseshoe Estate, Migge was also in charge of the open space planning on the Siemensstadt estate, the Onkel-Toms-Hütte housing estate in Berlin-Zehlendorf, and on the Römerstadt estate in Frankfurt am Main, which was built under the direction of local city planning officer Ernst May. Unlike most of his New Building colleagues and companions, Migge sympathized with National Socialism in the early 1930s, but remained suspicious of the new government and increasingly withdrew to his self-sufficiency project on Sun Island in Lake Seddin. He died of kidney disease in 1935.