Hansahochhaus, Brick Expressionist high-rise building in Neustadt-Nord, Germany

The Hansahochhaus is a 17-storey, 65-metre office tower at Hansaring 97, built 1924–25 to Jacob Koerfer's design. Its reinforced-concrete frame is clad in dark red hard-fired brick, with suggested pilasters, triangular window lintels and Art Deco keystones. A taller tower with a stepped-back flat roof carries the white "SATURN" sign; a "SAVOY HOTEL" sign sits below.

Jacob Koerfer submitted his plans to Cologne's city expansion office on 11 January 1924, and the shell was finished by 25 October 1924; the building opened in June 1925 after 15 months and 135 working days. Mayor Konrad Adenauer wrote to Koerfer of his "special interest" and hoped his "boldness would succeed". With 17 floors and 65 metres it was briefly Europe's tallest building.

The name refers to Hansaring 97, the street whose name recalls Cologne's membership in the Hanseatic League. The dark red hard-burnt brick facade, with suggested piers, triangular window lintels and Art Deco keystones, is Brick Expressionism. Above the pointed ground-floor windows are sculptures of animal and human heads by Joseph Pabst and Franz Albermann; five figures symbolising the continents stood between the second-floor windows until the Second World War and are now lost.

The Hansahochhaus stands at Hansaring 97, between Ritterstraße and the Hansaring S-Bahn station on Cologne's inner ring. The brick facade, the stepped tower and the Saturn and Savoy Hotel signs are best seen from the street. A paternoster lift serves the first to fourteenth floors, with the lowest entry on the first upper floor.

The structure was completed in remarkably short order, with only 135 working days of actual construction spread across 15 months. This rapid pace was noteworthy for the era and demonstrated advanced building organization and modern construction techniques.