Hidden Path [Street Art Tour]
Grashina Gabelmann takes an alternative street art tour through Berlin's Kreuzberg and Friedrichshain... There are lots of tours on offer in Berlin that describe themselves as alternative and promise to take you on the “path less trodden” -- but something about The Hidden Path's beautiful website, with its hand drawn elements, made its declaration seem more authentic. The starting point of the tour was in front of 'Casino 36', a grimy and dodgy looking building covered in graffiti [...]
Givebox
Dougal Squires talks to the founder of Givebox in Berlin, a simple yet wonderful concept based on the idea of "caring and sharing"... Andy is a friendly, confident man, and particularly enthusiastic about the Givebox that he has founded here in Berlin. He wants to remain anonymous - hence the lack of surname - which poses a problem for me, as he was to be the central part of my interview. But what has gone relatively unreported through the numerous articles about the Givebox over the [...]
Behind the Wall in ‘Stasiland’
Bookslut's Jessa Crispin talks to Australian author Anna Funder about her 2003 book Stasiland... Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall is a document of a city in flux. After the fall of the wall, the East and West found itself intermingling, sometimes unwillingly, in a city that had to transform itself structurally and demographically very quickly. Australian journalist Anna Funder found herself drawn to these places of tension. In Stasiland we meet a former propagandist for [...]
Hidden Europe’s Guide to Lichterfelde
Nicky Gardner and Susanne Kries, editors of the excellent Berlin-based Hidden Europe magazine, profile their much-neglected suburb... Prosaic places are so often the most interesting spots. And the Berlin suburb of Lichterfelde ranks as decidedly prosaic. None of the main English-language guidebooks to Berlin so much as mentions the suburb where we live and work. Tourists do not flock to Lichterfelde to see the great sights of a community that, fifty years ago this summer, awoke on a [...]
Biblioteca Culinaria
Peggy Schatz drops into Berlin's new place for cookbook collectors and enthusiasts - the Bibliotheca Culinaria (Culinary Library). By definition, Bibliotheca Culinaria is a second-hand bookshop specialising in cookbooks. But if one reads between the lines -- or has a chinwag with the owners, Swen Kernemann-Mohr and Johannes Mohr -- it becomes clear that Bibliotheca Culinaria is much more. For 30 years these men from the Rheinland, who previously ran a flourishing florist, indulged [...]
Putting the Bee in Berlin
Raising bees on rooftops and in small gardens has become increasingly popular in Berlin, as urban beekeepers find they can reconnect with nature and maybe even make a profit. Christian Schwägerl reports... From the flat roof of a brick building in Berlin‘s Kreuzberg district, the German capital looks like a concrete jungle. Apartment blocks, churches, and office buildings dominate the panorama. But Erika Mayr thinks this spot is the ideal habitat for her seven bee colonies. “My bees [...]
With New Eyes – A Berlin Audio Tour
For one month only (October 2011), Berliners have the chance to experience the city as blind or visually impaired people do - sonically. What does it mean to travel through a city while listening to the different sounds and noises a city creates? And what sound and noises make up a place like Berlin compared to other cities? Going through a city in this way opens up your ears again. You will experience the city in a different way during and after the tour for two reasons: on one hand you'll [...]
The GDR Murals Of Magdalenenstrasse U Bahn
The Berlin U-Bahn station Magdalenenstraße, on the city’s U5 line, does not have any advertising hoardings along its walls. Instead, it features a remarkable series of hand-painted murals depicting scenes from German labour history, created by the German painter Wolfgang Frankenstein. The murals were commissioned and installed by the East German government in 1986, as part of their official celebrations of the 750th anniversary of the founding of the city of Berlin in 1237. There were [...]
Weinstein
Molly Hannon visits Weinstein, one of Prenzlauer Berg's best, yet most understated restaurants... Upon entering Weinschenke Weinstein, you immediately sense that this is not your average German bistro or chi chi Prenzlauer Berg dive. It exudes the air of a restaurant that is fine and feathered with wine barrels and old vintages bottles lining the wall paired with simple wooden tables and furnishings. There is nothing fancy or intimidating about this establishment - in fact, it [...]
City Lit: The Beauty of Transgression
The Beauty of Transgression is a vivid remembrance of Berlin’s gritty, loud last decades of the 20th century, and a meditation on where the city’s unique sensibility is headed. Danielle de Picciotto’s Berlin memoir begins with her arrival in the divided city in 1987, though its story follows threads back into her and her family’s past as well as the dark, glittering history of the German metropolis itself. Artist, musician, filmmaker, curator, co-founder of the Love Parade and more, [...]



