Gedung Sate

Gedung Sate with it’s characteristic ornament that looks like a sate stick, has been a landmark building for the city of Bandung for a long time. Not only for residents of Bandung or West Java, but people all over Indonesia recognize the style of the building which has become an example for several other buildings in West Java The building of the railway station in Tasikmalaya is a good example. It was constructed in the 1920’s and as of today the still white government building is now used as the center of power for the province of West Java.

During the Dutch colonial time, Gedung Sate was known as the Gouvernements Bedrijven or GB. The first stone was laid by Johanna Catherina Coops, the eldest daughter of the mayor of Bandung, B. Coops and his wife Petronella Roelofsen, which were the representatives of the Governor-General in Batavia, J.P. Graaf van Limburg Stirum, at 27 July 1920. The building is the result of a planning team that was made up from Ir. J. Gerber, a young architect with name from the Technische Universiteit Delft in the Netherlands, Ir. Eh. De Roo and Ir. G Hendriks from the local government of Bandoeng.

Construction of the building

Around 2.000 people were involved in the construction of the building. 150 of them were highly skilled stone and wood workers from the Chinese regions of Konghu and Kanton. They received help from other stone-workers, coolies and other workers which lived in the villages of Kampung Sekeloa, Kampung Coblong Dago, Kampung Gandok and Kampung Cibarengkok. They ealier worked on the Gedong Sirapbuilding at the campus of the Technische Hoogeschool Bandoeng (nowadays Institut Teknologi Bandungand Gedong Papak, the city hall of Bandung.

After four years of construction, in September 1924, the main building for the Gouvernements Bedrijvenwas finished, as well as the main office for the PTT (Post, Telefoon en Telegraaf, Mail, Telephone and Telegraph) and a library.

Architecture

The architecture of Gedung Sate is a work of Ir. J. Gerber and his group which had in mind to make a design that closely resembled the works of famous Dutch architect Dr. Hendrik Petrus, which used many traditional features from all over Indonesia in his designs. Many architects and structural designers say that Gedung Sate is a monumental building that expresses an unique architectural design, which is known as Indo-European architecture.

A few of the poeple that praise the building are Cor Pashier and Jan Wittenberg, both architects from the Netherlands. They say the “architecture of the building is the result of an experiment which pushes the looks of the building towards Indo-European.” D. Ruhl mentioned Gedung Sate as the “most beautiful building in Indonesia” in the book Bandoeng en haar Hoogvlakte from 1952

Dr. H.P. Berlage, during his visit to Gedung Sate in April 1923, said that “the building is one of the biggest architectural works which melted features from west and east in an harmonious way”. It is similar to the style of architecture in Italy during the Renaiscance. The several stories high tower in the center of the building has some similarities with a pagoda as well. Until today there are a number of Indonesian architects that praise the building for it’s architectural strength, for example Slamet Wirasonjaya and Ir. Harnyoto Kunto.