WWII left, among other trails, a set of military buildings (bunkers, refuges, submarine bases), which conform a rather difficult-to-manage heritage since its association to dramatic and painful historical events. The introduction of new uses related to culture and contemporary art in these buildings, interesting under an architectonic point of view, may defuse their ideological burden and allows society to appropriate them without erasing their past but stepping forward into their own history. In this paper significative examples of this procedure related to Nazi buildings are studied: bunkers, Contemporary Art Tower (2001, Wien, Austria) and the Boros Collection (2008, Berlin, Germany), and a submarine base in the French Atlantic seaside, now LIFE’s headquarters , Lieu International des Formes Émergentes (2007, St. Nazaire).