HOW DO YOU HAVE BREAKFAST IN LICHTENBERG?
Hard bowl, soft core: at first glance, Lichtenberg may seem a little bulky, quite large, gray and coarse. But it's worth taking a closer look! The easternmost district of the city offers country life, classicist pomp and a Nordic coastal feel.
Lichtenberg is a little bit like Charlottenburg's rougher sister. Not only are the zoo and animal park related, but the two palaces, Charlottenburg and Friedrichsfelde, also share personalities and history. While the Zoo station was the gateway to West Berlin, the former East Berlin was reached via the then huge Lichtenberg station. Reason enough for KPM, a native of Charlottenburg, to take a closer look around the area.
Well fortified for the day, the native Lichtenberger usually starts with breakfast at home. Newspaper, sandwich, egg and coffee. District tourists, however, can best fortify themselves for an extended tour with a bagel, waffles or cake at Nadia & Kosta. The small café is located in the romantic Kaskelkiez or Victoriastadt district, once a historic working-class neighborhood with beautiful Wilhelminian-style houses that make the area an open-air museum.
Friedrichsfelde Palace in Tierpark Berlin
We then head across Rummelsburger Bucht to Dark Matter, a former factory that has now become a hip, deep black light and sound gallery. If you prefer something less digital and more historical, hop on your bike and ride tall to the Stasi Museum and visit the archives in the former headquarters of the secret police. And while you're there, you can hop over to Pankow: Just 15 minutes away is a real gem of Berlin's architectural history: the Lemke House by Mies van der Rohe, a wonderfully functional box right on the Weißensee, which was built in the 1930s for just 16,000 marks.
The best way to get back to Lichtenberg for lunch is via the Dong Xuan Center and eat a pho, a curry or a Peking duck at one of the more than 250 vendors in the wholesale market. Well fortified, you can then stroll through the zoo to Friedrichsfelde Palace, which was acquired in 1785 by Peter Biron, Duke of Kurland (the very duke who commissioned our KURLAND ) and was built in the classical style.
But the district is most exciting at the weekend. In the Lichtenberg villages of Malchow and Wartenberg, you feel like you're in the countryside, while the Karlshorst harness racing track is (almost) like Ascot. That is, unless Berlin's biggest flea market is taking place on the grounds, so that traders instead of horses are doing their rounds. The best way to round off the day is with a view of the water in the new Hafenküche restaurant, where Mathias Brandweiner is the sommelier, who - as luck would have it - used to work in KPM production.
The spring-yellow Lichtenberg mug, the newest member of the Colors of Berlin family, provides the perfect start to the Lichtenberg adventure. We have taken the iconic cup from the BERLIN service created in 1996 by Enzo Mari together with the designers at KPM and honored the different districts with their own color schemes. So you can live in Munich but enjoy your morning pick-me-up in Mitte, have your afternoon coffee in Tiergarten and your evening tea in Lichtenberg. Or which is your favorite district?
