moorish elements of the steam engine house.
on our second day in potsdam we made a big potsdam tour all over the city. we started out in the brandenburger vorstadt - the district we stayed in - made our way along the havel passing by the lustgarten park towards the peripheries of the northern inner city and then crossed the mighty humboldtbrücke just to land in babelsberg, and to be more exact, park babelsberg. we would later continue our way back to our starting point via glienicker brücke, along the glienicker horn towards schiffergasse & practically ended our tour at the main plaza of potsdam: alter markt. we walked 20 kilometers that day, needless to say that we were exhausted when we finally entered our flat in the evening :P. but even though we had walked so much, it didn't feel stressful at all. we took our time and didn't hurry, basically meandering through the city at a strolling pace. there was a lot to take in, and since i took too many photos of all the sights we encountered, i decided to split this post into two.
enjoy part I, y'all :)
steam engine house & contemporary plattenbau.
the steam engine house was built for one purpose only - to pump water to sanssouci palace, for its water games. king frederick william the IV of prussia let it build by ludwig persius from 1841 to 1843 in a style that was of the utmost luxury, something that only kings had money for: neo-moorish architecture. it looks like a mosque, it is even equipped with a minaret, but even though it looks like a religious site, it absolutely isn't. the steam engine inside the building was strong enough to pump water through an almost 2 kilometer long pipeline, which then fed the big fountain in sanssouci park, the botanical garden & even the water pool on the ruinenberg. it is still today a masterstroke of technical art engineering. we didn't get to see the steam engine, but only the outer shell of the building.
we left the engine house and walked along the banks of the neustädter havelbucht. these lion sculptures were seemingly random, as the area around the bay is actually rather modern. after a bit of research i found out that this particular section of the bay is dedicated to japan, and it makes sense that these asian-inspired sculptures are part of it. in the background you can see lots of japanese trees as well. the park was created on the occasion of the fall of the berlin wall in the late 80ies and were a gift from japan to potsdam.
bathing woman - a typical GDR modern sculpture. i love finding those remnants of GDR past ❤
view over the bay. in the background the very distinctive high-rises.
industrial structures.
along the breite straße you can find grand town houses, just like this one.
and right on the other side another GDR relict: the rechenzentrum potsdam. formerly a computing center in GDR times ( built from 1969 to 1971 by sepp weber ) it is now used as a collaboration hub for creative minds & entrepreneurs. its existence is unfortunately in danger, unfortunately ( or fortunately? ), because of the very beautiful mosaics of the ground floor facades, and of course because of being one of the last affordable office buildings in potsdam. the mosaics have the title 'the human being conquers the cosmos' and basically depict everything that had to do with the accomplishments of aerospace. it was created by fritz eisel. the golden decorational elements inside the see-through cube in front of the building were part of the old garnisonskirche - which once stood at the exact place the rechenzentrum is now situated on. there are plans to replace the rechenzentrum with a reconstruction of this church, and to be honest, it's something the city of potsdam is quite divided about. while it's nice to have old buildings in a city, it's strange to replace something pretty iconic ( even if you are not really enamoured with modern brutalist architecture ) with something that actually was lost due to heavy disarray ( the church was bombarded & destroyed in world war II ). i think the architecture of the GDR state is part of history as well, and some buildings are quite a work of art, so why not keep them alive - just like they do with other historic structures - for remembrance purposes? as of now, the future of the rechenzentrum is basically settled, it looks like the old church will be rebuilt in the future - something that will cost millions of euro.
the film museum potsdam is situated inside the former stables of the city palace. we would later visit this museum on a rainy day, and i'd really like to recommend it, because it shines a wonderful light on GDR movies / the babelsberg film industry and german movie history. we spent a whole afternoon inside. it was just really interesting & designed very beautifully! there was a special exhibition about dance in film history, which i was absolutely enamoured with, as it showcased several of my favourite movies ( rocky horror picture show or dancer in the dark, everyone? ). i also loved the section about iconic GDR movies - which is something i actually need to look more into as there are quite some fantastic gems to be found there ( the legend of paul & paula for example, which is one of the very few GDR movies i've seen & declared a favourite of mine ).
the whole museum with the dome of the nikolaikirche in the background.
a closer look at the dome. the nikolaikirche is another building we had a closer look at ( right on this day, in the evening ).
the new lustgarten park is right in front of the film museum and there you can also find another GDR building, the former interhotel ( now mercure hotel ) from 1969.
another mosaic memorial can be found inside the lustgarten park: the karl-liebknecht-forum. it was erected in 1980 & designed by kurt-hermann kühn. it symbolizes life & battle of the socialist revolution & was part of being a place for political manifestations.
the neptune pool. this arrangement inside the park is mostly lost to us, only a few sculptures still exist. they replaced the lost sculptures with wire installations outlining their forms. in the future every single one of the wires will be replaced once more with the reconstructed sculptures of yore.
the city palace, also not an original, but reconstructed building ( potsdam was heavily bombarded in world war II - a lot of the city's layout is therefore really open & not so densely covered with buildings like in other old cities of germany ). it is now the headquarter of the brandenburg state parliament. the former castle was designed by georg wenzeslaus von knobelsdorff - who was a really, really big architect back in the day.
the entrance of museum barberini. i really, really wanted to visit this museum, but my parents weren't at all interested in it, haha. it's a museum for contemporary art ( including GDR art ) and it is still on my list of must-visit places! hopefully i will return to potsdam much sooner, than my mother did ( she revisited the city about 40 years later after her initial visit ).
and now, please tell me, which picture you like better: the first or this HDR one? i couldn't decide, i just love dramatic pictures, but also like more natural ones. by the way, the museum resides inside the barberini palace, which was modeled after the palazzo barberini in rome. it's another reconstructed building, the old one was erected in 1771/72 by carl von gontard, who was the mind behind a lot of famous potsdam sights.
another comparison where i could not decide what picture i liked more. the sculpture inside the atrium of the museum is called 'jahrhundertschritt' ( century step ) and is a work of wolfgang mattheuer created in 1984. it's a parable on the disruption of two dictatorships - national socialism & communism.
we still didn't get closer to nikolaikirche & the old market plaza, but we continued to admire the beautiful roofs.
alte fahrt, a branch of the river havel. alte fahrt translates into 'old way'. there were dozens of fishermen along the banks of the river, doing some serious fishing. when you listened closer you could hear a lot of russian. i have the feeling that russians love to fish ;)
the tower of the holy ghost retirement home. again, this is a site of a former church, but this time they did not erect it again. instead the architects paid homage to it with the tower, which resembles the baroque bell tower in its outlines.
i really liked the top of it, it reminded me of something to do with spacecraft.
the residences were built in 1997 by augusto romano burelli.
these cute houses were not far away from the havel as well, in fact they were once part of the fishermen's district!
right over the street next to the houses was a small green area where residents kind of made little hanging out places. with the fallen leaves on the ground it looked extra cozy. here you can also find the last remains of the old city wall.
where a human sees another,
not only oneself & their own world,
there falls a drop of rain,
that creates gardens out of deserts.
i really loved this little poem ❤
the kellertor house. it was once a city gate, but now it's a privately owned living space. it was re-erected in 2017 (!) but i seriously believed it was much, much older and not a formerly lost ensemble. behind the house there's a small open park you can visit, but we didn't went there.
the old canal runs directly next to the gatehouse. the canal actually stops a few meters from here, it was filled up in the 60ies but is currently being re-opened bit by bit. there are some things that i absolutely agree with, and this remodeling of an important piece of potsdam's city layout is one of them. who would not want to have a waterway through the city, like in good old amsterdam? i think bodies of water revivifiy every neighborhood.
time for comparison! please tell me, if you want to, in the comments which of my comparisonal pictures you liked the best.
a different view, with better light. and you can see very well, where the canal stops.
the humboldt bridge. built in 1970 it is a very slick & minimal one. loved the structures of the concrete & how the water reflected on it as well! this bridge helped in crossing the havel river to another district of beautiful potsdam: babelsberg.
the staircase onto the bridge.
the view from the bridge onto the inner city of potsdam.
waving goodbye ( temporarily ) to potsdam city & saying hello to babelsberg.
before we explored park babelsberg i took a photo of the hans-otto-theater with its remarkable foyer. it looks like some kind of mussel to me, like an oyster, or something. in front of this build you can see the theater ship. it's used for smaller shows & happenings.
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