Construction of the Berlin Wall began on August 13th, 1961, and it fell on November 9th, 1989. A lot of time has passed since then – the Wall has now been down for longer than it ever stood. Berlin changed rapidly, and remnants of the Wall are now scattered all over the city as historical souvenirs. Some areas left absolutely no trace of it, while others are still shaped by the Wall and the clashing cultures of East and West Berlin.
Potsdamer Platz
Potsdamer Platz was a bustling centre of activity in Berlin for a long time. The war devastated the area, and the square became a wasteland. Today, the square and the buildings around it are exemplary of the architecture after the fall of the Wall. The area still has the reputation of being rather desolate, but there are a few good restaurants on and around Potsdamer Platz.
Niederkirchnerstraße, Gropius-Bau and Prussian Parliament
The Wall neatly separated Kreuzberg and Mitte. On the West Berlin side was the Museum of Decorative Arts, (now known as the Martin-Gropius-Bau), one of the city’s most important exhibition halls. Members of the Berlin State Parliament now meet in the old Prussian Parliament. A section of the Berlin Wall is still preserved here, and it is integrated into the Topography of Terror, an educational site about the crimes of the National Socialist government.
Oberbaumbrücke
You’d never guess that the Oberbaumbrücke used to be so drab. The bridge on the border between Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg is now one of the busiest and most popular places in Berlin. Back then, Friedrichshain belonged to the DDR, while Kreuzberg was the main hotbed of alternative West Berlin culture. Today it’s easier to cross the Oberbaumbrücke. Instead of border guards, you are only held up by construction work and traffic.
Brandenburg Gate
“Attention: You are now leaving West Berlin”, warns the sign at the sector border. The iconic Brandenburg Gate used to stand in the capital of the DDR and the area still hosts the US and French embassies. Today, Pariser Platz is a magnet for tourists, and the Brandenburg Gate is one of the most recognizable symbols of Berlin.
East Side Gallery
The East Side Gallery – one of the largest works of art in public space – is a sizable section of the Berlin Wall. Not many visitors can resist taking a selfie with Leonid Brezhnev and Erich Honecker. This area is constantly changing, but not exactly for the better: Zalando, Mercedes and Amazon have all been building their monuments to competitive capitalism in the area.
Landwehr Canal
Terrible things happened around the Berlin Wall, but for many people in West Berlin, the Wall was simply everyday life as you can see in pictures of Kreuzberg from the 1980s. Paddling on the Landwehr Canal was a popular activity among West-Berliners, and many people still enjoy it today.
Kreuzberg
When the Wall stood, Kreuzberg was a remote area. People who had little money to spend and those who wanted to live as untroubled as possible by the government were drawn there. Rent was cheap, but you had to deal with a view of the Berlin Wall. Today it no longer blocks the view, but in some places (around the Engelbecken, for example) in the border area between Mitte and Kreuzberg, it’s obvious whether the houses stood in the East or the West.
The Reichstag building
At the time of division, the West German parliament sat in Bonn. The DDR’s People’s Chamber was de facto without influence and limited by instructions from the SED. Until 1970 it met in the Langenbeck-Virchow-Haus in Mitte, then at Alexanderplatz, and from 1976 in the Palast der Republik. Today, the German Bundestag meets in the Reichstag building, and the meadow in front of the building is usually filled with tourists.
Checkpoint Charlie
People crossed the border of the American sector and the DDR through the heavily-guarded Checkpoint Charlie. Today, tourists flock to this somewhat scruffy corner of Friedrichstraße: the border crossing has become a spot for happy snaps, even though it looks completely different.
The Spree
A boat trip through Mitte reveals how drastic the changes have been since the Berlin Wall fell. The Spreebogen was a border area back then, but today, Germany’s government quarter stands here. Along the same stretch of the Spree you can now see the Marie-Elisabeth-Lüders-Haus, (one of the parliament buildings).
Eberswalder Straße
The Berlin Wall ran between Prenzlauer Berg (East) and Gesundbrunnen (West). Prenzlauer Berg was characterised by dirt-cheap rent, dilapidated buildings and drab façades. Nobody living there when the wall was up would recognize the district now. It has been made over completely – gentrification has taken its toll. Instead of a border, there are crowds in Mauerpark and hip cafés.
Bösebrücke
The Bösebrücke, colloquially known as Bornholmer Brücke, at one of the most famous border crossings between East and West Berlin. It was here, at 11.39pm on November 9th, 1989, that the head of the border crossing, Lieutenant Colonel Harald Jäger, opened the barrier to thousands of DDR citizens who had gathered on the East side to test the new travel regulations announced at 7pm by Günter Schabowski. Nothing noteworthy happens here now. Instead of spies and border troops, today there is mainly traffic and billboards at this crossing between Wedding and Pankow. A supermarket stands where the border crossing once was.
More on the topic
Interested in Berlin’s history? Check out our list of vanished buildings, (or the list of mostly vanished department stores). How about a photo series of buildings in 1945 and now? Maybe you’re after something a little more tangible: did you know that you can still see damage from World War II in some areas? Want to know what it was like to live in the DDR? There are plenty of museums that will teach you about the Stasi.
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