About us

Our student halls of residence have a long tradition!

The Association for Ecumenical Student Residences was founded in 1957. It arose from an initiative by the then student pastor Carl Malsch together with committed members of the Protestant university community.

His goal was to alleviate the housing shortage of foreign students and to enable foreign and German students to live together.

The association's statutes stated: “The purpose of the association is to set up and maintain ecumenical student halls of residence with the aim of promoting the coexistence of German and foreign students in house communities and thereby making a contribution to international understanding.”

From the beginning, the association's student halls of residence were occupied by half foreign and half German students. Denominational affiliation never played a role.

In 2016, the association was renamed “Carl-Malsch-Stiftung e.V.” The association controlled the fate of the dormitories for another eight years before the houses became the property of the Hamburg-West/Südholstein church district in 2024 and have since been owned, looked after and been managed by bauwerk KIRCHLICHE IMMOBILIEN.

In all these years, the goal of making a contribution to international understanding through the dormitories has not changed. Especially given the global political situation, this goal is more important than ever for us and we are happy and proud that our houses accommodate so many different people from all over the world.