‘Familie’ Archives
(English) Natur-Park Schöneberger Südgelände
The snappily-titled Natur-Park Schöneberger Südgelände is a not-so-well-known 18-hectare urban park at the southern end of Schöneberg. The park has blossomed from the ruins of an old railway hub that was built in the 1890s, and which for 70 years operated as one of the city's busiest (including during WWII). The area was closed and abandoned following the division of the city and nature slowly began to work its magic, reclaiming the old crumbling administrative buildings and rotting [...]
(English) Berlin’s Best Christmas Markets
Ruth Michaelson profiles the best Christmas Markets in Berlin for 2011... The temperature has gone sub-zero and anything you plan on consuming had better taste of cinnamon or come mit Schuss. With Berlin playing host to over sixty Christmas markets annually, there’s no shortage of places for you to get your fix of Lebkuchen and gifts in the frosty open air… Best Of The Big Hitters Gendarmenmarkt The sparkliest of them all, lit with all the double-Dom grandeur you’d expect [...]
(English) Berlin’s community gardens
Berlin's super-sized community gardens (and why they should be exported to the U.S.)... When I’m in a city, I am drawn to the places in-between. Spaces, I mean, that somehow avoided being paved over, or built upon, or that once held buildings that have now collapsed, the rubble mostly hauled away, leaving only the structure’s ghost all filled up with spindly weeds. Sometimes these spaces are just surprising: When vacant lots are selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars just a [...]
(English) Marco Clausen: Berlin’s Urban Gardener
Madeline Maher chats to Marco Clausen, co-founder of Nomadisch Grün and the Prinzessinnengarten... Nomadisch Grün (Nomadic Green) launched Prinzessinnengärten (Princess gardens) as a pilot project in the summer of 2009 at Moritzplatz in Berlin Kreuzberg, a site which had been a wasteland for over half a century. Along with friends, fans, activists and neighbours, the group cleared away rubbish, built transportable organic vegetable plots and reaped the first fruits of their [...]
