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Countless authors, visual artists and politicians of all stripes chose idyllic Friedenau as their place of residence and work in the 20th century. How and where did they live?

Highlights

• A local guide takes you through the Friedenau country house colony
• Authors, expressionists and political extremes in a small-town idyll
• Discover Friedenau's hidden places!

Description

Friedenau, founded in 1874: in the past 100 years, successful authors, well-known painters and sculptors as well as politicians of all stripes have lived in this bourgeois idyll of small country villas and old buildings with beautiful Art Nouveau façades and front gardens. The expressionists Kirchner, Schmidt-Rottluff, Otto Müller and Ludwig Meidner as well as Hans Baluschek painted in imaginatively furnished attic studios. In Görresstraße, there was a sculptor's yard that was nicknamed Little Carrara. In the Ceciliengärten housing estate, Kolbe's sculptures Evening and Morning stand opposite each other. After Kurt Tucholsky and Erich Kästner lived here during the National Socialist era, an illustrious crew of German-language authors moved to Friedenau in the late 1960s and 70s to drink and discuss in 'literary pubs and clubs' and try to change society in West Germany. Now and then, shopping is done at the market on Breslauer Platz. They argued and got along (or not): Günter Grass, Uwe Johnson, Hans-Magnus Enzensberger, Max Frisch and many others. Two prominent Friedenau residents, Grass and Herta Müller, were awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. The idyllic atmosphere is deceptive, it was often politically turbulent here: the RAF carried out its first bank robbery, Rosa Luxemburg cooked with the Kautsky family and Hermann Göring grew up in a menage à trois. Goebbels and Theodor Heuss lived in Fregestraße. In Wilhelmshöher Straße, the political resistance of the Red Orchestra formed in the 'Einküchenhaus'. Find out more about the 'Friedenauer Rad' and the founding of the first boy group, the Comedian Harmonists. Finally, we visit Marlene, Helmut Newton and Jeanne Mammen at their final resting place: the Friedenau cemetery.

Includes

Guided walking tour of the Friedenau country house colony Local guide

Easy cancellation

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