ruinous villa inside park babelsberg. it was formerly the house of the ferryman.
the second part of our first full day in potsdam is about the park & castle babelsberg, a huge complex on the other side of the havel river & the lakes tiefer see & jungfernsee. this place was the main summer residence of emperor wilhelm I and his family. the park itself was designed & created by two really well known gardeners: peter joseph lenné & hermann von pückler-muskau. the 114 hectar park is big enough to spend a whole afternoon in ( we haven't even seen the whole park, only a small portion ), and even the castle itself & its surrounding buildings are worth a deeper look at. since we were basically only journeying through the park in order to get to know potsdam we missed out on a few spots. what we saw though, was still very beautiful, especially because of the wonderful autumnal surroundings. the weather on this day was quite exceptional, perfect for taking a ( little too long ) walk. but it's not only about the babelsberg park here, no, we will pass by more of potsdam's city later on.
when you enter the park you immediately see the flatowturm ( flatow tower ). it was habitable once, but these days it's empty. it's got quite a well-fortified look, like a defense tower or something. it also reminds me heavily of the eschenheimer tor in frankfurt, and i think i read somewhere that indeed that tower was inspiration for this one.
nearing the tower.
from time to time we cast a glance towards the havel and the tiefer see.
the sailor's house. this house was home to the royal fresh water sailors ( sailors that didn't serve at the sea, but shipped the inland rivers & lakes ). its gothic facade was quite an eye-catcher.
climbing the hill to the tower.
finally reached the top of the hill.
the tower looks like it's straight from a fairytale, sleeping beauty or rapunzel are coming to mind.
warm colours everyhwere.
after a short hike we neared the next building: the gothic court arbour. it formerly stood in the middle of berlin ( before the red city hall was erected ). it was once the place in berlin where court hearings took place. even though it looked different over the centuries this reconstruction actually is the closest to the original building that was first erected around 1270.
HDR version.
better look at the arbour.
the open arches make for a very interesting play of shadows & light.
beautiful frieze depicting various sceneries & animals.
and soon this palace was greeting us from afar: babelsberg palace.
the palace was built by karl friedrich schinkel, ludwig persius & heinrich strack in 2 construction phases, the first starting around 1833, the second around 1840. its english gothic style is remarkable, especially with the yellow brickstones. another thing that was remarkable about the building when it was built is the fact that augusta, the wife of emperor wilhelm, had a big influence on how the castle should look like. she had a lot of arguments with the architects during the construction and the architects had to follow her instructions in the end - albeit quite contrited, haha.
the kitchen building, which is separate from the actual palace because the empress did not want to have the smells of the kitchen inside it.
i really like the neo-gothic style, looks so clean & elegant.
the little alley leading up towards one of the five terraces surrounding the palace.
the main facade, which looks onto the lake tiefer see & glienicker lake.
since it was already afternoon i didn't have very good illumination for this side of the building, ha.
with HDR mode though, you could have a better look at it, haha. it looks a bit exaggerated, though, but anyhow. it does the trick.
beautiful little bench in front of the palace.
the palace looks onto glienicker lake & bridge. the bridge was our next goal. it's famous for being a connection to west berlin back in the day of divided germany. it was scene of several agent & spy exchanges as well!
but first we crossed this little canal ( a connection to the griebnitz lake & basically part of the teltow canal )
and passed by old GDR relicts. a konsum was some kind of supermarket back then. now, only the letters of the logo have survived.
this gate house is part of the hunting lodge glienicke, which we also didn't take a closer look at. i loved the juxtaposition of the graffiti with the baroque structures. right around the corner of this little lodge you can also find glienicke palace, another palace we didn't explore deeper. looking back now, i kinda want to revisit these places and discover more. oh, and by the way, we were officially on berlin grounds here.
glienicke bridge from the glienicker lake side.
and from jungfernsee.
before we crossed the bridge i spotted this little temple structure ( which i now can determine being part of glienicke palace - it's the rotunda inside the surrounding park of the palace ).
crossing the bridge & looking back into the direction of berlin.
from west to east in just a matter of minutes.
on the potsdam side again.
on our way back to the city this former gas station jumped into your eyes. it's a restaurant these days, but the old charm of a 1930ies gas station is still evident.
garage du pont is the name of the restaurant and it's also part of an oldtimer museum. garage du pont means 'bridge garage', because it's so close to the glienicke bridge.
another small GDR relict you could find here: these push-button devices for crossing streets. these are so ancient, i haven't seen any of these ever before.
we passed by the hans-otto-theater on our way back, but light wasn't very much ideal. the silhouettes were still charming, though.
and then it was time to visit nikolai church & alter markt, the plaza in front of it.
the old city hall ( 1753 - 55 ) with it's wonderful rotunda and the atlas right on top. it is part of the potsdam museum now.
atlas, the dude holding the weight of the world on his shoulders. one of my most favourite mythological figures.
inside nikolaikirche. st. nikolai was erected by karl friedrich schinkel ( remember him? he was one of the architects of the babelsberg palace ) from 1830 to 1837 - ludwig persius was also part of the construction again, as was friedrich august stüler. it's a beautiful neo-classical building with an aura that's almost freeing, open-minded. the dome, between, was added after schinkel's death, even though it had always been part of the blueprints of the church. the completion of the whole structure was in 1850 - about 10 years after schinkel's death.
the church was inspired the pantheon in paris & st. paul's cathedral in london.
outside on the steps of the church, looking down on the old city hall, knobelsdorffhaus & museum barberini.
the obelisk in the middle of the plaza. on the right you can see the fortuna portal of the brandenburg landtag. the whole plaza was designed to resemble italian piazzas - something frederic the great had a big faible for. another fact one should know: the whole ensemble was destroyed in world war II and only in recent years the plaza was reconstructed bit by bit to resemble the old frederican plans.
oh, i had to have another picture of atlas.
when you stand on the stairs of the nikolaikirche you can also see the old university building, which will be torn down consequently. it's a GDR building that apparently rips the baroque aesthetic of old potsdam apart and can't be tolerated anymore. instead they want to re-erect a historic quarter with about 40 new ( old ) houses and plazas. i'm a bit sad about this, because after all, the GDR is history as well and i feel like these buildings should be also worth enough to have them restored. instead, they are looked at as abominations and are deconstructed purposefully ( sometimes they just let them fall apart instead of trying to save them & restore them ). ah, well... i guess the stable doors are locked, the horse is inside, the decisions are over & done with. i'm just glad i got to see the building before they will tear it down in the next few years.
a nice big fat skull that's part of the obelisk.
nikolaikirche from below the steps.
the evening light was quite nice.
another view of nikolaikirche & obelisk.
the institue for teacher training 'rosa luxemburg'. the official name of the building.
inside the inner court of the potsdam city palace - now state parliament of brandenburg. just a few years ago there was nothing on these grounds.
ceci n'est pas un chateau - this is not a palace.
ah, well, i feel that with a little bit of effort it could've been restored rather nicely, with modern touches even ( don't you think the structure itself lookss pretty timeless already? ). but it just doesn't fit with the long vistas & surrounding splendor of the new ( old ) city center, or so they say.
VEB medicinal appliances berlin, operative part potsdam. VEB stands for volkseigener betrieb ( public owned operation ), which was basically the generic term for operating factories in the GDR. there were subdivided into individual industries and they also had various facilities all over the country.
looking back over nice ruinous houses onto the shiny dome of nikolaikirche. i love vistas like these, showing off the contrasts between several architectural styles. a city without contrasts doesn't feel like a city at all.
the front facade of the building langer stall ( long stable ) - a former riding hall. it's all that remains of this historic building. it's situated next to the rechenzentrum ( in close approximation to the garrison church grounds ).
we had to pass by the rechenzentrum again and we got to take a closer look at the mosaics.
there were really cool neon signs inside the windows of the building as well. realität - reality.
more window art. prinz apfel is/was a little illustration company situated inside the rechenzentrum. apparently the owner's on a world journey now, but you can still check out the cute instagram.
the entry to the big military orphanage, a building that's not an orphanage anymore but houses governmental institutions of the brandenburg state. it's potsdams biggest closed baroque building ensemble.
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