Category Archives: Berlin Landmarks
The museums in Berlin dedicated to the Berlin Wall
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The two separate entities of Berlin that existed before the Wall has now become one once again and now there is hardly a trace left of the former east-west division. The Berlin Wall, which was given the propagandistic name “Anti-Fascist Protective Wall”, was an almost impermeable border until it fell on November 9th, 1989. Today, many locations and museums pay homage to the stories of the divided city and tourists. Traces of the wall are still found in Berlin. Later, a number of museums began to dedicate themselves to the Berlin Wall and the history associated with it and are considered favorite tourist spots for those interested in the history of Berlin.
The GDR Museum
This happens to be one of the most visited museums of Berlin as it is the only museum that deals exclusively with life in the former German Democratic Republic. The museum holds a permanent exhibition. The exhibition offers exhibits on and about the ‘Wall’ and ‘stasi’ memorials apart from dealing with the former GDR in a purely scientific way. The focus of the exhibition is provided by the SED – the Socialist Unity Party – exploring topics such as the state, economy, NPA, brother states, ideology, opposition and the Stasi.The museum gets its exhibits of everyday life mostly by donations from private households.
Deutsch-Russisches Museum Berlin-Karlshorst
The museum stands on a site where World War II ended on Mai 8th, 1945 with the unconditional surrender of the German forces. The ‘Surrender Hall’ and the office of the Head of the Soviet Military Administration, Marshal Shukow, have been preserved to this day. This museum was officially opened on May 10th, 1995, the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the war in Europe. The museum holds an important place in Berlin as it serves as a memorial of the German-Soviet War 1941-1945 and also documents the pre-war history and political relations between the USSR, the GDR and the Federal Republic. The museum offers special exhibitions, presentations and guided tours based on the history of German-Russian relations during the 20th century.
Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum
A refugee camp was created in 1953 to provide shelter to about 1.5 million people who had left the GDR between 1949 and 1990 in the direction of the Federal Republic. West German and West Berlin politicians visited Marienfelde to officially show their solidarity with the refugees from the East. In the current times, a museum stands here which holds a permanent exhibition which showcases the causes, the history and results of the German-German refugee movement.
The Bellevue Palace in Berlin
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The Bellevue Palace in Berlin, located on the northern edge of the Großer Tiergarten park, along the right bank of the Spree and close to the Brandenburg Gate, the Victory Column and the Bundestag, is the official residence of the President of Germany and has been so since 1994.
It was originally constructed to serve as a summer home to the younger brother of King Friedrich II, Ferdinand of Prussia. Built and finished in1786, this palace features remarkable architecture and comprises of a long main building and two wings- a women’s wing and a Spree wing.
Its façade has a classical style while its interior is more contemporary. Its architect was Michael Philipp Boumann and it was the first neoclassical building in the whole of Germany. About 20 hectares of green lush grass surrounds this palace. You can take a wonderful stroll through this park.
This palace has had a very colourful history. Though built for Prince Augustus Ferdinand of Prussia, it later became the residence of residence of his niece Princess Alexandrine. It continued to be occupied by the Hohenzollern dynasty until the German Revolution of 1918. Later on it became a museum for ethnography and during the World War II it suffered great damages. However it was restored later on and made the secondary residence of the West German president. It was again reconstructed in 2004-2005. However this most recent reconstruction did not include living quarters.
It is generally believed that if the presidential standard is flown on top of the palace then the President is in Berlin. However this is not completely true. If the President leaves for a vacation the standard is not taken down. It is taken down only if the President happens to go to some other official residence of his.
Reichstag building: The historical edifice of Berlin
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Berlin has a rich heritage of historical buildings and sites and the Reichstag building happens to be a historical edifice in Berlin, Germany, which was constructed to house the Reichstag, parliament of the German Empire. It served as the house for Reichstag from 1894 to 1933, when a fire broke out to causing much damage to the building. The exact cause or the culprit behind the fire is still unknown but the Communists were blamed for it them. It gave a boost to Hitler’s Party, the NSDAP, who would soon come to power.
The building was damaged even more at the end of the war, when the Soviets entered Berlin. The picture of a Red Army Soldier raising the Soviet flag on the Reichstag is one of the most famous 20th century images and symbolized Germany’s defeat. Reichstag building became totally useless after the Second World War when the parliament of the German Democratic Republic met in the Palace of the Republic in East Berlin and the parliament of the Federal Republic of Germany met in the Bundeshaus in Bonn.
The building was made safe against the elements and partially refurbished in the 1960s. When Germany reunified on October 3, 1990, the attempt to restore and reconstruct the building was made under the directions of the world famous architect Norman Foster. After its completion in 1999, it became the meeting place of the modern German parliament, the Bundestag.
The major draw of this building is the large glass dome at the very top of the building. The dome has a 360-degree view of the surrounding Berlin cityscape. The main hall of the parliament below can also be seen from the cupola, and natural light from above radiates down to the parliament floor. A large sun shield tracks the movement of the sun electronically and blocks direct sunlight which would not only cause large solar gain, but bedazzle those below. However, the dome is not open for anyone now-a-days without prior registration.
Visit the Brandenburg gate at Berlin
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The Brandenburg gate in Berlin is situated in Pariser Platz 1 10117 Berlin. To reach there you can take the metro from Metro Stop Unter den Linden (S1, S2), or take Bus #100. It is cost free and so attracts even more tourists. Also, it is one of the most important landmarks of Germany and so automatically becomes a must see. The period when this gate rose to fame was the cold war. It marked the division of Berlin and Germany as it stands between East and West Germany.
This gate became a symbol of Germany’s violent past and also its present peaceful conditions. It has played an important role throughout the major events in Germany’s history. Though it has a colourful history the gate is important not only from that aspect but also from an architectural aspect. It was designed by architect Carl Gotthard Langhans in 1791. This entrance to the boulevard “Unter den Linden”, leading to the palace of the Prussian monarchs, is marked with grandeur and stature. Its design was inspired by the Acropolis in Athens.
A remarkable feature of the gate is the sculpture of the Quadriga, a four-horsed chariot driven by Victoria, the winged goddess of victory. This statue was taken by Napoleon’s troops in the Napoleonic Wars in 1806, as a war trophy. It was however reclaimed when the Prussians defeated France in 1814.
The gate’s history doesn’t end here. About a hundred years later the gate was used by the Nazis for their own objectives. The most important of which is their march in the form of a martial torchlight parade, celebrating Hitler’s rise to power and introducing the darkest chapter of German history.
This gate survived the turmoil of the Second World War and then stood straight throughout the cold war and thus came to symbolize ideological disputes. One of the most visited monuments of Germany, this gate was refurbished in 2000.
Some of the popular hotels near Brandenburg Gate in Berlin are:
The Ritz Carlton, Berlin
Potsdamer Platz 3
Berlin
030 337777
The Mandala Hotel
Potsdamer Straße 3
Berlin
030 590050000
Berlin Marriott Hotel
Inge-Beisheim-Platz 1
Berlin
The Westin Grand Hotel Berlin
Friedrichstrasse 158-164
Berlin
The Westin Grand Berlin, 5 star hotel in Berlin
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The Westin Grand Berlin 5 Star Hotel in Berlin
• Overview of the Hotel: The hotel is located at the Berlin’s historic Friedrichstrasse and provides a large spa, pretty grounds, and a unique lobby having the big staircase. The Brandenburg Gate is about 10-minutes walk away from there. The Westin Grand Berlin is the winner of the World Travel Award 2010. The hotel’s Relish Restaurant & Bar provides the modern food with French and Asian influences. A rich breakfast buffet is too provided there in the Coelln restaurant every day. The lobby bar provides the panoramic views from the windows. The hotel has total 400 rooms and it is the chain of the Westin.
• Amenities at the Hotel: With reference to general facilities in the hotel there are included as restaurant, bar, 24-hour front desk, grounds, terrace, non-smoking rooms, elevator, express check-in/check-out, safe, heating, baggage storage, stores in hotel. In services in the hotel it involves as Room service, meeting/banquet facilities, business center, babysitting/child services, laundry, dry cleaning, hair/beauty salon, breakfast in the room, ironing service, currency exchange, shoe shine, car rental, fax/photocopying, ticket service and concierge service
• Hotel Rules: With respect to hotel policies there remains a common and same criterion at the common rooms in the hotel. However, this hotel polices change and varies according to the type of room where a person stays in. The check in point into the hotel is 15:00 hours and the checkout point is until 12:00 hours. The cancellation and prepayment policies there vary according to the room type. Pets are allowed in the hotel for certain applicable charges. Hotel accepts cards as American Express, Visa, Euro/Mastercard and Diners Club.
• Hotel Room Types and Rates:
Deluxe Double Room: € 129 (Per Night)
Garden Deluxe Double Room: € 179 (Per Night)
Linden Superior Double Room: € 219 (Per Night)
Junior Suite: € 309 (Per Night)
Wallpecker Offer – Deluxe Double Room: € 190 (Per Night)
Mediaspree one of the largest real estate project in Berlin
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Mediaspree is known as to be the largest and one of the biggest property investment projects in Berlin. The purpose of this project is to develop space and infrastructure for telecommunication companies along a section and about the banks of the river Spree in order to force an urban renewal of the surrounding areas there on. One of the core thrust of this project is to convert the unused or temporarily occupied real estate to be transformed into office building, lofts, hotel and other such related new structures and buildings. Though implementation of the project was to be forced into from the 1990s but only a section of the project has been implanted so far. According to the promoter it visualizes the great opportunity as for the former East Berlin.
There a number of planner and real estate companies are involved in this project yet they are working under a banner name Mediaspree. The project site extends from about a 3.7 km long and has a 180 hectare space on both sides of the Spree riverfront, on the borders of the four districts comprising as Mitte, Friedrichshain, Kreuzberg und Alt-Treptow. It is bordered to the west by Jannowitzbrücke (de), to the north by the railway tracks of the Berlin S-Bahn (rapid transit trains), to the east by Elsenbrücke (de), and to the south by two streets (Schlesischen Straße and Köpenicker Straße). The Spree is about 150 m wide along this stretch and along here riverfront run comparatively straight. The river is cross-cut by about three bridges within the Mediaspree zone: Michaelbrücke (de), Schillingbrücke (de) and Oberbaumbrücke. There one can also see a good number of numerous industrial and trade buildings from the 19th and 20th centuries.
Around 19th and early 20th centuries, this entire region was primarily was hold by the industry and trade. Many of the buildings still standing there at the site from the ancient period and are in too much need and characteristic of the architecture of that era. Some of those buildings are shelved under the name Denkmalschutz (de) designation as of the historical importance monuments. Before the World War II the East Harbor opened in 1913 with along the massive storage facilities for grains and other goods as well as the
Eierkühlhaus (egg cold-storage warehouse) and the Eisfabrik (ice factory). In between 1939 and 1945 these premises were used for the German Armed forces. One of the major projects there started in the region after the fall of Berlin Wall was the Mediaspree-region after the fall of the Berlin Wall
Institute for Media and Communication Policy (IfM)
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Institute for Media and Communication Policy (IfM) was established as an independent research institute in 2005, the institute on account of its policies and with objective to work in the particular area was expanded to Berlin and had its one branch started working in Berlin Charlottenburg on February 2006. As according to its roles and duties the IFM is Europe’s only research institute that is entirely dedicated to issues and topics related to the media and communication polices. The funding of the institute is generated from the prominent German public and private media groups. Some of the premier scientific group that provide support and finance to the institution are as ARD, ZDF, RTL, Universum Film AG, Axel Springer AG, the publishing groups Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck, Der Spiegel and the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg.
The Institute’s scientific advisory council is formed of about 25 noted scientists with a credible reputation in filed of media and communication policy publications. Lutz Hachmeister, a journalist and media scientist, is the founding director of the Institute. The head office as already discussed is situated at in Berlin-Charlottenburg, however, it’s another branch has been formed in Cologne. The current ownership on the registration wise is as a non-profit, limited liability company (gGmbH) that runs independently.
It has stated in its mission statement that the IfM is “a forum for the media industry, research into communication and current politics”. It aims to offer “concrete models and options for the solution of mediapolitical challenges” as well as provide structure to various and different representatives even from the political sphere. There ambition is to get recognition for the economic and public relevance as well as the strategic importance of medial policies into the day today modern politics. The primary task of the Institute is to carry out the continuous maintenance under an online media industry database including divisions like print, radio, tv and online-media. Compiling, it has an annul ranking of the world’s most powerful and impressive media companies with a success rate of about 101% and more. More of its research work includes as the theoretical and empirical foundation for making a basic knowledge of media political ideas and positions, as well as it relate to specific terminologies like research into the shifting correlation of print and an online media. The IfM was also rated as one of the most prestigious non university institutes into the media as into the framework of the programme “Germany thinks”.
Coat of arms of Berlin
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The coat of arms of Berlin is extensively used for and is employed as for the representation and identity to the German City. Tough the different boroughs in Berlin use their different emblems and in such circumstances where a number of options were available to the city, the symbol of Bear had to struggle too much to place it at the respected spot for enjoying it at the current time. For centuries, bear had to share the spotlight with the eagles of Brandenburg and Prussia on Berlin’s coats of arms and seals. After the structuring and deployment of the constitution of Berlin, the symbol of bear was granted as the animal of coats of arms and seals. The state coat of arms is shown in a silver (white) shield, a red armed and red tongued, upright, grunting bear.
Historically, in Germany, around 12th and 13th centuries a good number of cities were found and thus the cities felt the need for the official seals and later on the personal coat of arms as to seal official documents like as covenants and orders. A seal or coat of arms was there used to be provided by then and a sovereign. At the time Berlin and Cologne as well other surrounding cities of Margraviate of Brandenburg were ruled by the Brandenburg Margraves that reined using red eagle as a symbol in official seals. Before, the appearance of Berlin’s coat of arms in the heraldic and sigillographic world, the red eagle was noticeable presented in the seals and coats of arms of towns along the rivers Spree and Havel as well as in Berlin and Cologne. The oldest kept on and preserved seal of Berlin is dated to year 1253. It shows, the Brandenburg Eagle spreading its wings in and about clover shaped archway. The text, there on the seal is sigillvm de berlin bvrgensivm (seal of Berlin’s citizens). It is assumed as the seal of Berlin’s first mayor Marsilius.
The customary coat of arms was employed in varying styles in different range till the year 1920 and displayed the Prussian eagle in the first field, the eagle of Brandenburg in the second field and the bear in the third field. However, the citizen of Berlin was much pressed up for their own symbol and coat of arms. The reason for selecting out the bear as symbol still remains the mystery till the date. The most possibilities that lies with assuming the Albrecht I, alias the “bear” that is resembled as the conqueror and founder of the Margraviate of Brandenburg.
Berlin State Opera, a common platform for legendary composers
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The Staatsoper Unter den Linden is a German opera company whose permanent residence is situated at the Unter den Linden Boulevard in the Mitte district of Berlin that even hosts the Staatskapelle Berlin orchestra. With perspective of historical background of the place, King Frederick II of Prussia after the short time of his succession to the throne constructed the building at the site. Construction to the opera started on July 1741 on the basis of design by Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff to be the first part of a “Forum Fredericianum” on present-day Bebelplatz. Though the opera was not completed to the full, it started with the performances of Carl Heinrich Graun’s Cesare e Cleopatra on December 7, 1742. This started the camaderie of about 250 successful years between the Staatsoper and the Staatskapelle Berlin, the state orchestra, whose roots goes as back as to about 16th century.
In 1842, Gottfried Wilhelm Taubert started the culture of the regular symphonic concerts and in the same year, Giacomo Meyerbeer succeeded Gaspare Spontini as General Music Director. Felix Mendelssohn also carried out many a number of symphonic about and during a year. On August 18, 1843 the entire Linden Opera was destroyed in a fire. The reconstruction of the structure carried out by architect Carl Ferdinand Langhans, and the Königliches Opernhaus as started in the commencing year with the performance of Meyerbeer’s Ein Feldlager in Schlesien. In 1821, the Berlin Opera provided the premiere of Weber’s Der Freischütz. In 1849, it premiered Otto Nicolai’s Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor, as carried and composed by the composer himself.
While at the end of the 19th century and at the start of the 20th century, the Royal Court Opera, Berlin, caught up the attention of many illustrious conductors. This included Felix von Weingartner, Karl Muck, Richard Strauss, and Leo Blech. After the fall of German Empire in 1918, the Opera was renamed Staatsoper unter den Linden and the Königliche Kapelle and became the Kapelle der Staatsoper. With an extensive renovation work, the Linden Opera started in April 1928 while with a new production of Die Zauberflote. Within the same year, the renowned Russian bass Feodor Chaliapin and Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes with conductor Ernest Ansermet staged guest performances there. When the Nazi Hitler take over the Germany, the members of the Jewish origin were there dismissed over and from the collection. There many German musicians who were performing in the opera as went into exile, and even includes the conductors Kurt Adler, Otto Klemperer and Fritz Busch. After the Berlin Wall was reconstructed in 1961, the Opera was there remained isolated, however managed the repertoire that even featured the classic and romantic period along with contemporary ballet and operas.
Berghain, the Berlin night club
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Berghain is a Berlin nightclub, which is recognized and is popular and also is named for its location between Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain. Philip Sherburne a noted popular cult musicians has named and it has quite possibly the current world capital of techno, much as E-Werk or Tresor that was there at the respective heydays and the best times.
The club is located in a former power plant in Friedrichshain that is situated behind the Berlin Ostbahnhof railway station. The building can be differentiated from other structures due to the massive dimensions that it keeps. It is too tough to adjust about an n 18 meter high dancefloor and space for about 1500 guests, and it also has a minimalist interior design, with prominence of steel and concrete. The club has a main room in the form of “cavernous” and there are many other smaller upstairs spaces that are even known to be as Panorama Bar that is even decorated by massive by Wolfgang Tillmans photographs and big windows that present the views of rather big East Berlin buildings.
The club is known for strict adherence to decadence and hedonism, according to a New Zealand Herald article describes “people openly indulges in sexual acts” inside the club, and the basement has a dark room categorically for that purpose and utility. Photography is restricted there and even door policy is selective, but there are no such concepts like VIP entrance or VIP areas. Special guestlist there mostly is being kept to dj and for maximum gain is for each staff member. Absence of mirrors or reflecting surfaces is it’s another unique feature.
Berghain has reemerged from the noted club Ostgut and Ostgut too had emerged from a night club named as “Snax”. “Ostgut” after getting the new name became the central point of the Berlin’s techno-subculture. The name “Berghain” combines the two quarters of the building, the south and the north. “Snax” is yet organized while once in a year. The music of the club is mostly techno, minimal techno and dubstep. From 2005 the club’s owners started a record label, Ostgut Tonträger. The label’s first releases were by Berghain/Panorama Bar residents like as André Galluzzi, Cassy, and Ben Klock. In 2007, Berghain worked together with the Berlin Staatsballet to form “Shut Up and Dance! Updated” a ballet as for five dancers who performed at the club in late June and early July.
