Prior to the war, the square was home to the Reichsmarineamt (Reich Navy Office, originally on Leipziger Platz 13, moved to No. 17/Voßstraße No. 20 in the 1900s), the Wertheim flagship department store (numbers 12-13), the Mosse-Palais (headquarters of the German publisher Hans Lachmann-Mosse, Leipziger Platz 15), Palast-Hotel (No. 18-19) and the Prussian Ministry of Agriculture (No. 6-9).