Weissensee Wanderings

In January I wrote an article about Weissensee which was published, in a heavily edited form, on the Slow Travel Berlin website.  Last year I spent quite a bit of time in this part of the city for one reason or another – my two-month stint working in a call centre on Berliner Allee, the week of cat and flat-sitting in Langhansstrasse and the summer afternoons when we cycled to the lake armed with books, blankets and beer.  It’s a fascinating place for a ramble and it’s only a ten-minute walk from our flat to the beginning of the district at Prenzlauer Promenade (which is nowhere near as grand as it sounds). 

Here is my article, in its original form:

Factories, Friedhöfe and Films: Exploring Berlin’s ‘White Lake’ Neighbourhood

 

 

It’s a hot, languid Friday afternoon in July.  I’m sitting on a blanket on a patch of scraggy grass that slopes down to the Weisser See, the compact but charming lake from which the neighbourhood to the north east of Prenzlauer Berg takes its name.  Sun worshippers, families with beach balls and dinghies, and a nude bather or two have turned out for some early weekend recreation.  Energetic swimmers make for the lake’s frolicsome fountain while ducks and swans glide by, indifferent to the antics of their human companions.  As we’re only a few yards away from the ‘Milchhäuschen’ my partner and I are contemplating taking a stroll over for a beer on its lakeside terrace.

The first time we’d visited the lake, one drizzling February afternoon, the prospect had been rather forlorn; the Milchhäuschen’s terrace had been deserted, its tables and chairs in winter storage, and the only people about had been joggers and dog walkers.  At the time we lived opposite the tram stop for Prenzlauer Allee S-Bahn station and for some reason, we’d never explored this end of the city much beyond that point until that day in February when we decided to set off on foot for Prenzlauer Berg’s northern reaches.  A ten-minute walk past a few supermarkets and housing blocks brought us to Caligariplatz, a miniscule square sharpened to a point at the junction of Prenzlauer Promenade, Gustav Adolf Strasse and Heinersdorferstrasse.

Caligariplatz marks the south-westerly tip of Weissensee (established as the village of ‘Wittense’ in the Thirteenth Century and greatly developed and expanded in the late 1800s), at times attractive and well-heeled, at others a faded backwater, it often has the feel of a separate town rather than a suburb of the Hauptstadt. There are no hipster hangouts here, no paleo restaurants or third wave coffee shops.  And whilst a kilometre or so away in Prenzlauer Berg, olive oil boutiques and artisan pasta shops persuade locals to part with their cash, retail outlets in this part of the city are of a far more prosaic nature.  There are exceptions, such as the record shop on Gustav Adolf Strasse whose windows full of Duran Duran and Depeche Mode albums suggest an early 80s fetish, or the little shop in Langhansstrasse which sells only preserves, but they are relatively few in number. 

 

Brotfabrik, Caligariplatz

After that first foray, which took us on a meandering walk up to the lake and back, Weissensee became a favourite destination for our urban rambles.  Our acquaintance with the district deepened when we worked for a time at a call centre on Berliner Allee and contrived to walk home via a different combination of back streets every night.  We also spent a week cat-sitting for friends in their lovely Weissensee flat at the end of November.  For the reasons I’ve already mentioned, it’s not the number one destination on most visitor’s lists but a day spent exploring is worth consideration, not least because of the many surprises it has up its sleeve.  The first, if approaching via Prenzlauer Allee, can be found at Caligariplatz where an information panel details the area’s erstwhile importance as the ‘Hollywood’ of Europe.  In the early years of the Twentieth Century, the major German film studios were located in the neighbourhood, their most famous product being the silent horror classic ‘Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari’.  Screen legend Marlene Dietrich debuted here in the 1923 melodrama ‘Tragödie der Liebe’.

Nowadays, almost nothing persists of this legacy; the studios have long since disappeared from the landscape and of the many cinemas the area once boasted, only the Kino Toni on Antonplatz has survived.

Back on Caligariplatz, the dominant structure is the yellow-painted ‘Brotfabrik’.  A former bread factory as its name indicates, Brotfabrik is now a cultural centre housing a cinema, theatre, gallery and bar.  Across the road is the Delphi, a delightfully atmospheric but sadly dilapidated one-time silent movie theatre.  Funds are currently being sought for a redevelopment project aimed at transforming the Delphi into a multi-arts space.

A wander around the streets to the east of Caligariplatz – an area of car workshops, ‘Friedhöfe’ and former factories – yields more unexpected finds, such as the Kunsthalle on Hamburger Platz.  Run by a prestigious art college, the Kunsthalle, with the outward appearance of a community centre on a council estate, hosts cultural events of all kinds, from exhibitions to film screenings.

Car workshop, Heinersdorfer Strasse              

The large, leafy Georgen-Parochial-Friedhof III, across from the Kunsthalle, includes former Weissensee worthies and victims of World War II among those laid to rest within its walls.  Behind it are allotments and a community garden.  A little further along, on Gustav-Adolf Strasse, is a striking complex of five apartment houses grouped around sculpture-filled gardens.  The project of sculptor Sergej Dott, each brightly-coloured house is decorated according to a particular theme, for example, fish, rabbits, birds and butterflies.

East of the cemetery, on Pistoriusstrasse, is the Shri Wadim Shakti Tempel which contains an art gallery and a garden full of nude statues. 

Pistoriusstrasse is one of half a dozen streets which converge on Mirbachplatz, a small square, one side of which is taken up with the Café Mirbach.  In summer the café’s terrace is a hive of activity as locals gather for a beer, Kaffee und Kuchen or more substantial German fare in the shadow of the Bethanienturm, the church tower on the square’s central island.  The church was built at the turn of the Twentieth Century to accommodate the area’s growing population and suffered severe damage during World War II with only the tower escaping. 

Further east is Berliner Allee, the area’s main artery and the heart of the original village.  The section between Antonplatz and the Albertinenstrasse tram stop is the main shopping hub being lined with Euro shops and bakeries.  Locals can be found tucking into hearty platefuls of eisbein with red cabbage and mashed potato at Fleischereien which double up as lunch spots and on Tuesdays and Fridays Antonplatz hosts a food market. 

Eastwards of Antonplatz, accessed via Herbert Baum Strasse, is the Jüdischer Friedhof, the largest of its kind in Europe, with some 115,000 graves over a 40-acre site.  Notable tombs include those of painter Lesser Ury and murdered resistance fighter Herbert Baum.  Although the cemetery sustained some war damage, miraculously it was left largely untouched by the Nazis and occasional services were carried out right up until 1944.  Today, memorials commemorate victims of both World War I and the Holocaust.

Jewish Cemetery

 

Following Berliner Allee in the direction of the lake, Buschallee is notable for its Bruno Taut houses and across the road, at number 185, is the lakeside house in which dramatist Bertolt Brecht and his wife Helene Weigel lived between 1949 and 1953.  The house, like the row of abandoned shops alongside it, is rather run down; only the inscription ‘Brecht Haus Weissensee’ above the entrance gives any indication as to its illustrious one-time occupants. 

Brecht Haus, Berliner Allee

 

At the junction with Liebermannstrasse, a modest plaque marks the location of the ‘Filmstadt Weissensee’ and round the corner is the pocket-sized Joe May Platz, named after the director and film pioneer whose studios stood here.      

Although nothing is produced in Weissensee any more, industrial architecture abounds.  Brick-built, with soaring chimneys and sometimes tiled à la the Hackesche Höfe, many former factory complexes have been repurposed as residential premises while others stand empty, waiting perhaps for developers to give them a new lease of life.  Domestic architecture in this part of the city covers a diverse spectrum: the factory conversions sit side-by-side with DDR-era apartment blocks, Altbau tenements and individual villas.  Rents are lower than in the ‘trendier’ neighbourhoods but many buildings, both residential and commercial, whose ‘potential’ might be exploited elsewhere in the city remain derelict.

Abandoned factory

 

Weissensee is hardly a secret – it’s the eponymous location for a major German TV series for a start.  Nor is it off the beaten track, being served by a number of bus and tram routes.  It is however, rewarding territory for urban explorers with something of interest to be found in practically every street.

The lake at dawn