Three infrastructural elements contributed to its strategic location. Moreover, the vicinity of the concentration camp site to the river Havel was a locational advantage for the future transportation of materials by water. The southernmost tip of the projected concentration camp site extended as far as Lake Schwedtsee. The area designated for the camp was in an isolated place enclosed within natural boundaries β a virtually ideal situation for the erection of a state-of-the-art concentration camp.
In January , a group of inmates of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp was detailed to start building the new facility. A number of non-local companies and corporations were also involved in the building works. Before that, women who did not conform to Nazi standards were held in protective custody in penal institutions and correctional facilities. A little later, in March , it also took in women from other provinces.
In December , the female inmates in Moringen were moved to Lichtenburg, now the central concentration camp for women. Lichtenburg, a castle dating back to the Renaissance, had been used as a concentration camp for men as from This administrative act was accompanied by a significant worsening of the detention conditions, which included solitary confinement in dark cells in the bunker in Lichtenburg, food deprivation, prolonged standing etc.
On top of that, there was a support building with kitchen, showers and laundry. The buildings were meant to house approximately 3, female prisoners. The whole site was surrounded with a four-metre high wall topped with high-tension barbed wire. Next to the dormitory was a common area; washrooms and toilets were in the middle. After the invasion of Poland, further barracks were added. However, they were soon no longer sufficient to hold the increasing numbers of deportees from the countries invaded, which made the living conditions for the prisoners catastrophic on the whole.
Because of the pressing need to accommodate more prisoners, other facilities went up as well, such as a telephone exchange, a waterworks, a sewage treatment plant and an electrical substation. They all helped to make the camp complex self-sufficient. It needed to be extended in because of capacity constraints. In , it was also used to detain a large number of special prisoners, i.
