It’s a relaxed morning start, bowing briefly to jetlag for our first day, before Adam Tooze, provides the first lecture in a series on the history of Berlin. The youngest of our four great cities, Berlin is a city stamped out of the sandy soils of Brandenburg by the Prussian monarchs in the 18thcentury, rising to global prominence with meteoric speed in the late nineteenth century, a city that experienced the traumas of the twentieth century like no other, a city where we can see history having been made only yesterday. In a great burst of energy Berlin wrote itself into history after 1871 as a hotbed of modernism and a laboratory of contemporary technology and industry. After 1933, it became the command center of Hitler’s Empire; after the defeat of 1945, the divided epicenter of the Cold War; and after 1991, many would say, again the true capital of Europe.
Adam’s talk this mid-morning will cover Germany’s history from the Reformation to the 18th-century reign of Frederick the Great, the Prussian king who held the throne for nearly 50 years and believed in ‘enlightened absolutism.’ He was not only beguiled by art and music–Bach offered his Musical Offering to him as an homage–but a great general too.
After the lecture and discussion, we depart the Kempinksi for an orientation walking tour of the neighborhood, including the Brandenburg Gate, a little dip into the Tiergarten with its mighty vistas and boulevards, and the River Spree. Our final aim is the Reichstag, home to the Imperial Diet from 1894 until its destruction in 1933. Our local guide and historian will use our walk to illustrate the concept of Berlin as a cultural hub and its self-image as a ‘New Athens’, and to explain the workings of today’s German parliament, the Bundestag, in the modern Reichstag Building.
Post-war, the West German government assembled in Bonn, far to the west, while the East German government remained in East Berlin. The building you see today, with its distinctive dome, is therefore a metaphor for post-Reunification Germany. In 2004, the British architect Sir Norman Foster restored the original building, adding the glass dome with its spiralling interior walkway as a symbol of transparent democracy. We will visit the dome and dine on top at the Käfer Dachgarten-Restaurant, one of Berlin’s most sought-after dining spots, with fabulous 360-degree views of the metropolis below.
This afternoon we will pay a visit to the German Historical Museum. A friend of Adam and Dana’s is a curator here and will give us a special introduction to the museum's collections. The permanent exhibition covers 1,500 years of German history, from border changes and the development of the language, to every phase of the country’s history, from the Middle Ages to the First World War and the Weimar Republic to National Socialism. It ends with the fall of the Berlin Wall and Reunification.
The rest of the late afternoon is at leisure: feel free to continue exploring the museum on your own (there’s an attractive museum café) or to wander around Berlin to capture some of its energy and atmosphere.
Keep an eye on the weather: if it’s good, Adam and Craig will be on the roof terrace bar of the Hotel de Rome, discussing the relative merits of enlightened absolutism and modern democracy, which will become clearer as they work their way through the cocktail menu. Join the fun! If it’s dreary, Dana will selflessly lead a ladies’ raid on Annette Görtz, her favorite boutique in Berlin.
The night is yours to do with what you will.
THE HOTEL ADLON KEMPINSKI BERLIN (Breakfast (B), Lunch (L))
