Rock Around the Dock

For most of the last half-century, Düsseldorf, the capital of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, relied almost entirely on its harbor for its growth within the Rhineland, Europe's third strongest economic region after London and Paris. And as the city began to shift from strategic shipping hub to creative media center in the early 1990s, its chevron-shaped dockside led the way. Today, following over a decade of frenzied development, MedienHafen (Media Harbor) has become a hip center for great restaurants, swish bars and dimly lit lounges, many housed in outré structures designed by the likes of Frank Gehry, Steven Holl...

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