Our visual content impresario, Ilias Jimenez, recently traveled to Berlin and shared his real-time, first-person photo diary with us.
Near the train station at Alexanderplatz
Without further delay, in his own words and photos:
The first thing that struck me about Berlin was its side-by-side mix of high and low culture. Berlin feels like the creative, urban offspring of Manhattan and Brooklyn. High art and architecture see eye-to-eye with graffiti and street art at almost every turn. The coffee shops, live music, underground functions, bicycle riding, cloudy-to-rainy weather, just the right amount of dirty, and good + cheap food & drink. (NYC in the ‘90s, anyone?)
At first glance, Berlin appeared to be haphazardly organized — disorienting for sure — but also ideal for discovery.
Gaudystraße street
Kreuzberg
The Visit – Coffee Shop
The Visit is in the “Soho” of Berlin, a.k.a. Kreuzberg.
I walked through an alley into a courtyard and there it was. The light hit this coffee cup just right that I felt no editing was needed.
Note: The music was on point everywhere I went.
Church in Mariannenplatz (on the edge of Kreuzberg).
Taking Gaudystrasse to Mauerpark and Bernauer Straße
I followed Gaudystrasse until Mauerpark — at end of the park, you have Bernauer Straße where you can see the remains of the Berlin Wall.
The rebar is still there. The surrounding area is still very industrial.
Mauerpark
Bernauer Straße
An homage to the Berlin Wall
60’s modern housing meet graffiti
One of the locals
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Berlin Architecture
Berlin has a long, convoluted architectural history. It’s interesting to see modern design intent almost everywhere.
Kreuzberg
Gaudystraße
Adalbertstraße
Street Art + Graffiti
Street art and graffiti are everywhere in Berlin — in basements, alleys, subways, homes, universities, high-end residential areas, and virtually every bathroom — and unabashedly mixed with high architecture.
People have decided to tag everything located on the ground floor of Berlin. Everything.
Adalbertstraße
Oranianstraße
Mariannenplatz
Mariannenplatz
Note: the active parts of Berlin are also littered with beer bottles at night, and they are all gone by sunrise thanks to the bottle collectors.
Everything is closed in Berlin on Sundays. Good luck finding anything open. That’s probably a good thing though. I assume the entire city is sobering up from the city’s pils. I’ll be back in a month.
Prost!
By Ilias Jimenez (as told to 818’s editorial director, Jed Wexler)
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