Our building

From substation to music school – the story of Emmericher Straße 280.

Where drums, piano and choir sound today, electricity for the Lower Rhine was distributed for decades. Our building at Emmericher Straße 280 was the switch house of the RWE substation Kleve. Since 2000 one half has been home to MUKL – in the other half, wall to wall with us, Stadtwerke Kleve still have their offices and workshops. Since 2023 the building has been a listed monument.

around 1880
Villa Maria in Kellen – today to the left in front of our building – is the farmhouse of a large farm. When much of the land is sold to the van den Bergh margarine works, farming here comes to an end.
1910
The town of Kleve and the energy company RWE sign a contract on electricity and the tram. Soon the electric tram is running – its depot is right next door.
1916–1918
RWE plans a large substation for the new 110 kV line, originally even with a connection to the Netherlands. The choice falls on the Villa Maria plot: right on the main road, with a possible rail link and easy to reach for the line. To keep the price down, RWE buys through an intermediary.
from 1919
The villa becomes the home of the head of the RWE office in Kleve and houses the offices. The previous tenant only moves out in 1927, after a court case.
1937/38
Construction of the 110 kV substation. The switch house – our building today – is built as an open square: the switchgear in the central part and south wing, staff rooms in the north wing.
1945
Kleve is badly destroyed – but the power supply from here continues.
1975
The office wing is extended; the site is the base of RWE’s northern operations division.
1988
Villa Maria becomes a listed monument.
2000
The music school – then still called “rhythm & groove factory” – moves into one half of the building: on 400 m² there are 11 teaching rooms and a concert hall. The other half is still used by Stadtwerke Kleve, who own the building, for offices and workshops – wall to wall with the music.
2023
Our building becomes a listed monument too.

Historical photos

Click a photo to enlarge it.

**from 1912** · The Kleve tram in Beek (Netherlands)

The electric tram on Herzogstraße in Kleve

**1910s/20s** · A horse-drawn cart of the Heeck haulage firm from Kellen – this is how material reached RWE’s building sites

**1920s** · Replacing a transformer at the Briener Straße station – with the help of a tram car

**1920s/30s** · A break on the grounds of Villa Maria

**1937** · Construction of the 110 kV substation Kleve

**1973** · The staff of the RWE Kleve operations group at RWE’s 75th anniversary

Office wing and switch house of the substation – our building today

A childhood at Villa Maria (around 1930)

A boy who grew up in the villa remembers the first modern sockets in the house, a huge electrically heated cooking pot, fruit trees whose fruit the children could eat as much as they liked – and the circus that pitched its tent on the big meadow opposite.

Source of texts and historical photos: Peter Harder, Licht für das Klever Land. Die Geschichte der Stromversorgung im alten Kreis Kleve 1911–1991 (German), RWE Energie AG, Regionalversorgung Krefeld, Kleve 1992. The photos are shown by kind permission of Stadtwerke Kleve.

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