Alt-Berlin (bar)

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Building Münzstraße 23 with the Bierstube Alt-Berlin, 2010

Das Lokal Alt-Berlin was a beer bar , pub or pub on Münzstraße in Berlin-Mitte , which opened in 1893 and closed in 2014. It was one of the oldest such institutions in Berlin. After the closure, the facility was reopened several times in different locations, each time using original furnishings. Bars with the name Alt-Berlin are often found in Berlin and other German cities; Until the closure in 2014, however, this was considered the oldest. In 2016, the old Berlin found its new permanent place with the original furnishings at Chausseestrasse 102.

history

The bar, which opened in 1893 directly after the construction of the Münzstrasse 23 building (today a monument ), was part of the milieu described by Alfred Döblin in Berlin-Alexanderplatz during the 1920s ; According to Oral History , it was popularly known in the 1930s and 1940s as "To the three cracks", because the Berlin street prostitution was nearby and the bar was run by three women. In 1945 the intersection was badly damaged shortly before the end of the war ; After the end of the war, a restaurant opened here again that - again according to hearsay - was run by a personality from the underworld who is said to have been imprisoned in 1949 for various robberies. The HO took over the restaurant during the GDR times. Myths about the bar, which is said to have been a retreat for prostitutes and an artists' meeting with Bertolt Brecht as a regular guest, and which was certainly a typical Berlin “Kiezbar”, circulated in the “new Berlin” in great numbers.

The interior was practically original until the 2010s, although the pub was downsized after it was damaged in 1945; There was a bar at the entrance to the front, and in the “parlor” at the back there were seats and tables. According to a slogan exhibited in the shop window "The most beautiful of all things - a sip at Heinz and Inge" (after the owners of the bar during the GDR period, who are said to have lived in the apartment above the pub for a long time), the bar was alternatively also " Heinz and Inge ”. After 2000 in Berlin-Mitte, the place was one of the few remaining meeting points or retreats (there was no way to look into the restaurant from the outside) for a “local” audience who did not go along with the slow transformation of the quarter into an international shopping mile.

Around 2014, the investor Harm Müller-Spreer, himself a former regular guest in old Berlin, bought the area in which the restaurant was located in order to increase its value; the rooms then gave way to changing lifestyle showrooms.

Reactions to the closure and subsequent time

There was extensive coverage in the Berlin press about the end of Old Berlin. For the weekly magazine Focus , the end of the pub was a sign that the traditional Berlin neighborhood bars were getting “tight”; According to Andreas Mühe , it even meant the final "death of the Mitte district". The British Guardian also reported on the closure as a significant event in Berlin's transformation from an alternative city on the fringes of events to a hotspot of capitalism. Around the closure there were various protests, Facebook campaigns ("Alt Berlin - let's show courage") and also a petition against the closure, which was unsuccessful.

According to newspaper reports, however, the old Berlin should be "respectfully implemented" and thus preserved, according to the investor's will and to protect the local culture. In fact, there was also a temporary reopening in the modern ecclesiastical art gallery “Platoon” on Schönhauser Allee . There, however, the counter including the “Heinz and Inge” sign and guest room was then - in contrast to the previous situation - put on display in a kind of public installation. Most of the previous guests followed the translation of their traditional bar into this new context, at most temporarily, before the pub in this location was finally closed.

In June 2016, a new incarnation opened , again using original furnishings, in Berlin's Chausseestrasse . Numerous media reported on this as well, and in the course of increasing gentrification of Berlin, the reopening of Old Berlin was increasingly in the public interest. The wooden counter, the lamps, the furniture and the dark oak wall paneling had previously been temporarily stored in a container for two years. With the move to about three kilometers as the crow flies, the old Berlin also remained authentically within the radius of action described by "Franz Biberkopf" from the novel Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin . Due to the immediate vicinity of the “Ballhaus Berlin”, celebrities also come here spontaneously, as happened at the original location after German reunification , when Quentin Tarantino , Bill Murray , David Bowie , Max Raabe or Jürgen Klopp drank their beer here just as undisturbed , like the people from the neighborhood . In 2017, Henry Winkler , Terry Bradshaw , George Foreman and William Shatner came to "Alt-Berlin" as part of their European tour for the NBC reality and travel TV show Better Late Than Never , where David Hasselhoff was also there . In 2018, at 125 years old, Alt Berlin was one of the oldest Berlin pubs with a historic interior (even if it was no longer at the original location). The anniversary was celebrated on May 27, 2018. For the Soccer World Cup in 2018, there were public viewing . In addition, the beer garden was transformed into a tropical city garden in the style of urban gardening , and in winter into a Christmas forest. On September 9, 2018, the Berliner Abendschau reported on the vintage flea market. Old Berlin is increasingly moving into the retro trend of the Roaring Twenties . "We want to save the spirit of the Golden Twenties in the present", explained owner Christof Blaesius on Spiegel Online . The magazine Gala also listed the old Berlin as “A legend lives”. On December 11, 2018, filming for the crime TV series Babylon Berlin took place in old Berlin . For this purpose, the entire interior was restored to its 1929 state in every detail. Just a few weeks earlier, the Moka Efti Orchestra , a 14-person ensemble around the composers Nikko Weidemann and Mario Kamien and the saxophonist Sebastian Borkowski, who played the hit Zu Asche, zu Staub on stage in the series , was in the immediately adjacent “Ballhaus Berlin “performed live.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1]
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  4. ↑ Uwe Aulich, Sabine Deckwerth: Investor Harm Müller-Spreer: “Speculator” criticizes the construction plans on the Alex. In: Berliner Zeitung . June 9, 2014, accessed April 21, 2016 .
  5. ↑ a b [4]
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  8. ↑ [7]
  9. ↑ [8]
  10. ↑ [9]
  11. ↑ [10]
  12. ↑ [11]
  13. ↑ EXHIBITION: ALT BERLIN A LIVING SOCIAL SCULPTURE ( Memento from March 13, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  14. ↑ [12]
  15. ↑ [13]
  16. ↑ [14]
  17. ↑ [15]
  18. ↑ [16]
  19. ↑ Everything postponed. In: sueddeutsche.de. June 2, 2016, accessed September 11, 2018 .
  20. ↑ [17]
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  23. ↑ [20]
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  25. ↑ [22]
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  27. ↑ [24]
  28. ↑ [25]