The Berlin Wall at 50
Today is an anniversary. The Berlin Wall went up 50 years ago. Imagine a family arriving at Friedrichstraße station in
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From Berlin to Lviv, Ukraine
Turn your back for a moment on the West, and travel East as a corrective. Jump the train from Berlin, and
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Getting Messy at Burgermeister
Burgermeister (a play on words on Bürgermeister, which means the ‘city mayor’ with the simple addition of an umlaut) is a burger
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A German Market on the Maybachufer
On a Tuesday or Friday, I see the veiled women of Neukölln and Kreuzberg making their way to the canal,
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Hitler’s Bloody Palace: Mohrenstraße
Blood red, sometimes purple, the marble’s colour was signed off by Hitler himself. It decked his grandest building, the New Reich
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The U55: The Shortest Subway
It has only three stations, it took 14 years to build, it connects a distance that can be easily covered
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The Other Face of Kreuzberg: The Werner-Düttmann-Siedlung
On Fichte and Körtestraße, just up from Südstern U-Bahn, you might pass by an elegant wine shop, a Michelin restaurant
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Forcing Hitler Underground: The Führerbunker
Their bodies were doused with petrol and incinerated in a bomb crater, here, in what is now a parking lot. Adolf
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Chaos and Colour: Haus des Lehrers
There’s a blaze of colour on Alexanderplatz. When Berlin is at its winter’s darkest, the sensation of alienation heightened by
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Paris-Moskau Restaurant: In the Shadow of the Railroad
Come to Hauptbahnhof, Berlin’s main station, at 4:30 or 15:40, and watch the creaky train carriages depart, carrying passengers for
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The Changing Names of Südstern U-Bahn
This underground station in Kreuzberg has had many names. It was born Hasenheide in 1924, it became Kaiser-Friedrich-Platz and then
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