traveldk.com

Stylish Berliners shop here for up-to-the-minute and top-of-the-range designer clothes.

This branch of the American Guggenheim museum, together with the Deutsche Bank branch Unter den Linden, show changing exhibitions of modern art of the highest standard from the US. During recent years, Deutsche Guggenheim has thus managed to become one of the most successful and popular art venues in the city, with an emphasis placed on installations. In 1999, the retrospective of works by Dan Flavin was a particular highlight. Treasures from the Deutsche Bank archives are also shown here. Pop into the small museum shop and refresh yourself with a coffee from the museum café.

Café, pub and restaurant, especially popular with actors.

Stylish (and expensive) bespoke tailors for ladies, boasting a fantastic selection of luxurious materials.

Giant chocolate sculptures of Reichstag and Brandenburger Tor adorn the windows and tempt visitors into this shop, a chocaholic’s paradise.

The historic structures of this architectural complex in Unter den Linden are among the finest attractions in Berlin. From 1740, Frederick the Great commissioned the prestigious Early-Neo-Classical buildings for the area around today’s Bebelplatz, and personally influenced their design: Deutsche Staatsoper, the first free-standing opera house in Europe; Catholic St Hedwigskathedrale, Alte Bibliothek and Prinz-Heinrich-Palais, later the Humboldt University. Bebelplatz itself is particularly interesting. A memorial set into the ground reminds of its dark past – in 1933, it was the venue for the Nazi book burning. Frederick’s successors commissioned Altes Palais and a memorial statue of “the old Fritz”, surrounded by “his” buildings. Christian Daniel Rauch created the 13.5-m (44-ft) high equestrian bronze figure in 1840. It portrays Frederick the Great wearing his trademark tricorn hat and coronation mantle and carrying a walking stick. The statue has always turned its back to the east – but wags claim that the East German government mistakenly set up the figure the wrong way around.

Friedrichstraße has risen to some of the glamour and vibrancy it possessed before World War II. Today, Berlin’s Fifth Avenue once again boasts elegant shops, and some upmarket restaurants and cafés, which have opened here in recent years. Especially worth visiting are the three Quartiers 205, 206 and 207 within the Friedrichstadtpassagen, containing the Galeries Lafayette store and Department Store 206 respectively. At the northern end of the street is the famous Dussmann store (books, music, events), S-Bahn station Friedrichstraße, as well as the former entertainment district with the Friedrichstadtpalast, today housing the Metropoltheater.

Berlin’s most attractive shop is the only branch of the luxury French store in Germany. Here you will find elegant fashion and gourmet foods on the lower level.

This square, whose strict layout is reminiscent of an Italian Renaissance piazza , is probably the most beautiful in Berlin. To the left and right of Schauspielhaus – today’s Konzerthaus – stand the twin towers of Deutscher and Französischer Dom (German and French cathedrals), dating back to the late 18th century. Gendarmenmarkt, named after a regiment of gens d’armes stationed nearby, was built at the end of the 17th century, as a market square. The Schauspielhaus (theatre) on the north side of the square, built by Schinkel in 1818–21, was used as a theatre until 1945. Damaged in World War II, it was reopened as Konzerthaus (concert hall) in 1984. A statue of the playwright Friedrich Schiller stands in front of the building. Französischer Dom, to its right, is a prestigious Late-Baroque building; concealed behind it is the French Friedrichstadtkirche, a church serving Berlin’s Huguenot community. The Deutscher Dom opposite, built in 1708 on the south side of the square for the Reformed Protestant Church, did not receive its first tower until 1785. Today it has an exhibition on democracy in Germany.