VanDam's StreetSmart® Berlin 2020 Edition maps all top attractions including museums, monuments, architecture, hotels, churches, synagogues, mosques and theaters plus the complete U-Bahn and S-Bahn network at an immensely legible scale of 1:20,000 complete with 3-D building illustrations. Clear information design allows you to read the map from three feet away and has earned VanDam maps a place in the MoMA Collection. The map is film-laminated, accordion folded and pocket size. Contents: Greater Berlin, Potsdam & Brandenburg Overview Map: 1:200,000; Berlin Street Map: 1:28,000; Mitte Detail Map: 1:20,000; U-Bahn & S-Bahn Map, Dimensions: 4 x 9 folded, 9 x 36 unfolded, fits into shirt pocket or purse.
StreetSmart® Berlinis so legible you will instantly understand how the Museum Insel connects with Charlottenburg, Mitte with Kreuzberg, Friedrichshain with Teuffelssee and Potsdam with Spandau. Our map will be your treasured companion. Berlin is a relatively young city planned for a population of 6 million but with only 3,6 million inhabitants. It is eight times the geographic size of Paris. Berlin feels airy and expansive with lots of trees. Opined a local: You do not need a country place as the country is in the city. Indeed, there are many lakes, rivers and nature spots in the city perfect for a swim within easy walk from the U-Bahn or S-Bahn. There is even a pop song (a Schlager) which goes like this: "Pack die Badehose ein, Nimm Dein kleines Schwesterlein und dann nischt wie raus nach Wannsee."
StreetSmart® Berlin shows all public transit lines on the street map in context including the new U5/U55 Kanzlerbahn slated for a late 2020 opening.
Berlin, Germany's Metropolis, has been an edgy, creative hub with a distinct dialect, sense of humor (Berliner Schnauze), and aroma (Berliner Luft) since at least 1871 when Bismarck created the country we know as Germany with Berlin as its new capital. History lurks around every corner.
Bearing witness to its darkest moments the Jewish Museum, Holocaust Mahnmal, Neue Synagogue, Alter Jüdischer Friedhof and the plaques on buildings in Charlottenburg serve as reminders of the German Jews who created some of the best of German Kultur. Berliners are legendary for inventing and shaping 20th Century art, culture, politics and science: From Albert Einstein (astrophysics) to the Bauhaus (design), Berthold Brecht (epic theater) to Marlene Dietrich (Hollywood), Rosa Luxemburg (German Communist Party founder) to Willy Brandt (Berlin mayor and German Chancellor), Walter Benjamin (literary critic) to Hannah Arendt (political theorist) and many more. The list of innovators is endless. Nazism caused a severe brain drain and cultural self-amputation. Berlins loss was New Yorks gain.
In the 21st C. Berlin is again brimming with new ideas and cultural re-invention. Part of this reinvention is the sizable Israeli LGBTQ community, said to be close to 20,000 strong. Its magazine Spitz is a culture guide entirely in Hebrew.
StreetSmart® Berlin Among our favorite activities: Shopping around Savigny Platz, sampling the counter-culture of Prenzlauer Berg, gallery hopping on Auguststraße with a stop at the Jewish girl school with its Neue Sachlichkeit design then dinner and dancing at Clärchen's Ballhaus. If you want to go to techno heaven Berghain is the ultimate dance venue. After recuperating head to the Vorasiatische Museum in the basement of the Pergamon to have your mind blown by how 4,000 year old Babylonian miniatures could have such sublime color. Feeling like a Berliner..? Then take the S-Bahn to the Bürgerablage a favorite swimming hole in Spandau. Gain instant Berlin StreetSmarts®
