Tiergarten

The Tiergarten, with its 500 acres of parkland and 16 miles of footpaths, has become the largest recreational area in Berlin, transformed in the 19th century by P. J. Lenné from the Kurfürst’s animal enclosure into an English-style landscape garden. The most colossal of its numerous monuments is the Siegessäule and its gilt Victory, erected [...]

Charlottenburg Palace

The wide Baroque dome , the most beautiful of the Hohenzollern palaces, was built in the 17th and 18th centuries and named after Sophie Charlotte, the wife of Frederick I. In addition to the royal couple’s quarters in Frederick the Great-style Rococo, it houses the Gallery of the Romantics (C. D. Friedrich, Carl Blechen) in [...]

Kurfürstendamm

This 2.2 mile shopping boulevard and its side streets offer a colorful variety that make strolling down it a pleasure: department stores and restaurants, boutiques and cafés, luxury hotels and theatres, fascinating museums and art galleries, luxury goods and junk. Originally a bridle path leading to the hunting lodge of the Kurfürst (Elector) in Grunewald, [...]

The Brandenburg Gate and Pariser Platz

Built by C. G. Langhans in 1788-1791 and modeled on the Propylaea (the gateway to the Acropolis), the Classical-style Brandenburg Gate at the end of the magnificent Unter den Linden boulevard has repeatedly been at the forefront of historical events. Its allegorical group of sculptures, Gottfried Schadow’s Victory and Quadriga, pays homage to Frederick the [...]