Sights in Berlin
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Checkpoint Charlie
Checkpoint Charlie was the principal gateway for Allies, other non-Germans and diplomats between the two Berlins from 1961 to 1990. Unfortunately, this potent symbol of the Cold War has become a tacky tourist trap where uniformed actors pose for tips in front of a replica guardhouse. The one redeeming aspect is the free temporary open-air exhibit chronicling Cold War history along Friedrichstrasse, Zimmerstrasse and Schützenstrasse.
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Shell-Haus
Looking like a giant upright staircase, the eye-catching Shell-Haus is one of the most famous office buildings created during the Weimar Republic. Designed by Emil Fahrenkamp in 1931, it was one of Berlin’s earliest steel-frame structures and is concealed beneath a skin of travertine. Its extravagant silhouette is best appreciated from the southern bank of the Landwehrkanal. It’s now the headquarters of a local gas company.
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Heckmannhöfe
For a retreat from the urban frenzy, skip on over to this idyllic courtyard complex linking Oranienburger Strasse with Auguststrasse. Kick back with cake and cappuccino in one of the cafes or browse around some unique shops like the Bonbonmacherei, an old-fashioned candy kitchen, and Sterling Gold, which specialises in retro ball gowns.
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Bauhaus Archiv
Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius himself designed the avant-garde building that now houses the Bauhaus archive and museum with its distinctive white shed roofs. Inside, changing exhibits using study notes, workshop pieces, photographs, blueprints, models and other objects and documents, illustrate the Bauhaus theories.
Highlights include material relating to Gropius’ 1925 Bauhaus buildings in Dessau and Lázló Moholy-Nagy’s clever kinetic sculpture called Light-Space-Modulator. Nice cafe and cool shop stocked with Bauhaus-inspired gewgaws.
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Galerie Wohnmaschine
Berlin has witnessed a proliferation of galleries in the new millennium, including branches of renowned American and British galleries, including New York’s Galerie Goff + Rosenthal. Other pioneering ventures include Galerie Wohnmaschine, Galerie Eigen+Art, Contemporary Fine ArtsNeugerriemschneiderGalerie Thomas Schulte.
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AEG Turbinenhalle
Peter Behrens (1868-1940) who is sometimes called the 'father of modern architecture' designed the 1929 Berolinahaus on Alexanderplatz (now a C&A clothing store), but his most accomplished structure is outside the centre: the 1909 AEG Turbinenhalle, an airy, functional and light-flooded ‘industrial cathedral’ with exposed structural beams. The building is considered an icon of early industrial architecture.
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Volkspark
Berlin's oldest public park (since 1840) provides treasured relief from urbanity. Besides expansive lawns, it has playgrounds, tennis courts, a free half-pipe for skaters, the adorable Märchenbrunnen (Fairytale Fountain; popular with gay cruisers) and various socialist monuments. Its two hills are actually piles of wartime debris; the taller one is nicknamed Mont Klamott. Summer events include a popular outdoor film series.
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Schloss Bellevue
The German president makes his home in snowy white Schloss Bellevue. The neoclassical palace was built in 1785 by Philipp Daniel Boumann for the youngest brother of Frederick the Great, then became a school under Kaiser Wilhelm II and a museum of ethnology under the Nazis. The president is supported by the Bundespräsidialamt (Office of the Federal President) based in the oval modern building south of the palace.
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Ramones Museum
They sang ‘Born to Die in Berlin’ but the legacy of the Ramones punk pioneers is kept very much alive in the German capital, thanks to this eclectic collection of memorabilia. Look for Marky Ramone’s drumsticks and Johnny Ramone’s jeans amid signed album covers, posters, flyers, photographs and other flotsam and jetsam. The on-site cafe also hosts the occasional concert.
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Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand
If you’ve seen the 2008 film Valkyrie, starring Tom Cruise, you’re well aware of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, the poster boy of the German resistance against Hitler and the Third Reich. The very rooms where a group of senior army officers, led by Stauffenberg, plotted the bold but ill-fated assassination attempt on the Führer on 20 July 1944 are now part of the German Resistance Memorial Centre. The building itself, the historic Bendlerblock, harboured the Wehrmacht high command from 1935 to 1945. Today the complex is the secondary seat of the German Ministry of Defense (the primary is still in Bonn, the former West German capital).
The centre’s exhibit…
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Zeiss Grossplanetarium
The people of East Berlin were not allowed to see what was across the Wall, but at least they could gaze at the entire universe at this fine planetarium. It opened in 1987 as one of the largest star theatres in Europe, boasting a ‘Cosmorama’, back then the finest star projector ever built. Today, programming ranges from traditional narrated shows (in German) to ‘music under the stars’ and children’s events.
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Museum Knoblauchhaus
The 1761 Knoblauchhaus is the oldest residential building in the Nikolaiviertel and the one-time home of the prominent Knoblauch family, which included politicians, architects and patrons of the arts who enjoyed tea and talk with Schinkel, Schadow and Begas. Take a spin around the neatly furnished period rooms to get a sense of how the well-to-do lived, dressed and made their money during the Biedermeier period.
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Chamissoplatz
On Saturday mornings, the entire neighbourhood turns out for Berlin's longest-running organic farmers market held on this pretty square framed by stately 19th-century townhouses. With cobbled streets, old-timey lanterns and even an octagonal pissoir, the entire square looks virtually unchanged a century on. No surprise that movie directors favour it as an outdoor set for Old Berlin.
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Schloss Charlottenburg
The grandest of Berlin’s surviving nine former royal pads is Schloss Charlottenburg. It consists of the main palace and two outbuildings in the lovely Schlossgarten (palace park). Each building charges separate admission, but it’s best to invest in the Tageskarte that gives you an entire day to see everything except the Neuer Flügel (New Wing). Come early on weekends and in summer. A palace visit is easily combined with a spin around the trio of nearby museums.
The Schloss began as the summer residence of Sophie Charlotte, wife of King Friedrich I. Their baroque living quarters in the palace’s oldest section, the Altes Schloss, are an extravaganza in stucco, brocade…
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Zucker Museum
Got a sweet tooth? Check out the quirky Zucker Museum (Sugar Museum), a surprisingly entertaining exhibit where you’ll learn all about the origin of sugar and its chemistry. Find out about its uses in the production of vinegar, pesticides and even interior car panelling and also discover its role in the slave trade. Descriptions are in German only, but a free English-language pamphlet is available.
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Nikolaiviertel
Bounded by Rathausstrasse, Spandauer Strasse, Mühlendamm and the Spree River, the twee Nicholas Quarter is a Disney-esque attempt at re-creating Berlin’s medieval birthplace around the 1230 Nikolaikirche, the city’s oldest building. The maze of cobbled lanes is worth a quick stroll, but you won’t find too many Berliners patronising the pricey cafes, restaurants and cutesy shops.
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Kennedy Museum
US president John F Kennedy of 'Ich bin ein Berliner' fame is the focus of the small Kennedy Museum, an intimate, nonpolitical exhibit set up like a walk-through family photo album. Besides a great array of photographs there are scribbled notes, JFK's crocodile-leather briefcase, Jackie's Persian lamb pillbox hat and a Superman comic-book edition starring the president.
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Liebermann-Villa am Wannsee
This lovely villa was the summer home of Berlin Secession founder Max Liebermann from 1909 until his death in 1935. Liebermann loved the lyricism of nature and gardens in particular and often painted the scenery right outside his window. Some can be seen in the upstairs rooms and his barrel-vaulted studio. In summer, there are few more languid spots then the garden and Wannsee-facing cafe terrace.
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Abguss-Sammlung Antiker Plastik Berlin
If you are a fan of classical sculpture or simply enjoy naked guys with missing noses or other body protrusions, make this small collection a stopover. With works spanning 3500 years created by cultures as diverse as the Minoan, Roman or Byzantine, you will be able to trace the evolution of this ancient art form. The shop sells plaster-cast copies.
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Schiller Denkmal
The memorial to Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805), one of Germany’s most revered poets and playwrights ( Maria Stuart, William Tell ) sits dignified in the middle of Gendarmenmarkt. Crafted by Reinhold Begas in 1871, it was squirreled away by the Nazis and ended up in West Berlin after WWII. In 1988 it returned across the Wall following an exchange of artworks between the two German states.
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Museum für Kommunikation Berlin
Three cheeky robots welcome you to this elegant, neo-baroque museum, which takes you on an entertaining romp through the evolution of communication technology – smoke signals to computers. Admire such rare items as a Blue Mauritius stamp, test out time-honoured communication techniques or ponder how information technology has changed our daily lifes. A multimedia iPod touch guide (€1.50) provides the full low-down.
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Volkspark Friedrichshain
Berlin’s oldest public park has provided treasured relief from urbanity since 1840 but only gained its two hills after WWII, when wartime debris was piled up atop two demolished flak towers; the taller one (78m) is nicknamed Mont Klamott. Explore this splotch of green and you’ll find expansive lawns for lazing alongside diversions for active types (tennis courts and a half-pipe for skaters) and a couple of handily placed beer gardens. In summer, cinephiles flock to the amphitheatre for an outdoor film series.
Travelling with kids? This is also one of the best park for them thanks to imaginatively themed playgrounds and the enchanting 1913 Märchenbrunnen (Fairy-tale…
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Berlin Zoo
Germany’s oldest animal park opened in 1844 with furry and feathered critters from the royal family’s private reserve. The zoo made worldwide headlines a few years ago with the birth of a polar bear named Knut, which, alas, died suddenly in 2011. Still, an astonishing 18,000 critters representing 1570 species make their home here, many of them in open - but moated - enclosures. The menagerie includes such crowdpleasers as cheeky orangutans, cuddly koalas, endangered rhinos, playful penguins and Bao Bao, the only giant panda on view in Germany.
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Friedhöfe vor dem Halleschen Tor
Berlin’s oldest cemetery has been receiving new members continuously since 1735 and is filled with beautiful tombstones, many of artistic merit. Famous Berliners buried here include the architect Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff, the painter Antoine Pesne, the writer and literary-salon patron Henriette Herz, the poet and painter ETA Hoffmann and the composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.
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Märkisches Museum
This old-school history museum is a rewarding stop for anyone keen on learning how the tiny trading village of Berlin-Cölln evolved into today’s metropolis. Official documents, weapons, sculptures and objects from daily life are thematically arranged, often in opulent historic rooms such as the Gothic chapel and the Great Hall.
Scale models help visualise the city's physical growth. Crowd favourites include the 19th-century Kaiserpanorama, basically a 3-D slide show that was a form of mass entertainment back then. A good time to visit is around 3pm on Sundays when the historic mechanical musical instruments are launched on their cacophonous journey (adult/concession…
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