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Times
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Times
The revamped art nouveau Berlin bolt hole loved by Brigitte Bardot
Overlooking the small but pretty Steinplatz, close to west Berlin's Zoologischer Garten, this upscale but intimate five-star stands out from its residential neighbours with a striking art nouveau façade that dates back to the early 20th century. Taken over by the German Roomers brand in 2025, the interior's historic curves and arches are still embellished with modern Jugendstil designs that favour natural motifs, and the small lobby welcomes guests with plush armchairs and granite-and-marble floors. Rooms remain sumptuous with additional contemporary touches and facilities are top-notch throughout, ranging from an overhauled restaurant, bar and atrium lounge, and a top-floor spa area offering massages, treatments and nifty city vistas. Service is friendly and professional. This article contains affiliate links that will earn us revenue Score 8/10Designed by German art nouveau legend August Endell, Hotel am Steinplatz originally opened in 1913 and quickly became a meeting point popular with celebrities such as Alain Delon, Brigitte Bardot, Romy Schneider and Vladimir Nabokov. Dormant for a while during the Cold War years, it was reopened exactly a century later, in 2013. The rooms, kitted out by Berlin designer Tassilo Bost, are all a little different in terms of layout and have restrained colour schemes (browns, beiges, blacks) and, more often than not, high ceilings and curving walls and windows, soft-leather furnishings and art deco lamps and mirrors. The dapper black-and-white marble bathrooms have heated floors and glamorous images printed on glass walls, and new Roomer touches include Marshall Bluetooth speakers, Lavazza coffee machines and 19-69 Kasbah toiletries. The smallest rooms (Deluxe) are still a good size and have views onto the quiet central atrium. The suites facing the leafy Steinplatz square get more light, as well as more space — some have separate living areas — and bathtubs. Your splurge option is the Sauna Suite, with its own private sauna; the Balcony Suite, where actress Romy Schneider was once a regular, has a spacious private 9/10 The ground-floor restaurant is the dapper French-themed Manon Brasserie Nouvelle. It's a small but smartly designed space with stylish seating in reds and oranges, and offers a Francophile menu that spans baked camembert, salmon with potato pancakes, and steak frites; the wines are excellent. Next to the restaurant is the bar, a plush and welcoming space, complete with a killer cocktail menu and regular DJs. Breakfast, served in Manon, is a buffet spread of cold cuts and croissants, warm dishes (sausages, scrambled egg, bacon), plus an à la carte menu of egg and pancake dishes — and, if you're in the mood, a glass of sparkling wine or a morning shot of Belvedere vodka. • Read our full guide to Berlin• More great hotels in Berlin Score 8/10The primary public space here is a small art deco lobby near reception consisting of a couple of leather chairs, a double-sided fireplace and a library of art and design tomes; make sure to peek at the adjacent glass-encased guestbook from the 1920s. The light-filled top-floor spa and fitness area, on the other hand, provides treatment rooms, saunas and a range of high-tech cardio machines and free weights. The courtyard has a retractable roof and Riviera-style furnishings that make it perfect for lounging; in summer, you can also take advantage of the bar's small but pretty outdoor terrace. Score 9/10The hotel is set on a quiet side street just off a busy one (Hardenbergstrasse) along which you can reach Zoologischer Garten in around ten minutes on foot. This is one of the main transport hubs for west Berlin and is surrounded by high-end shops and galleries. Plenty of cultural sights and great gastronomic options are also walkable in 20 minutes or less, including the C/O Berlin photo gallery, the Deutsche Oper, and the Helmut Newton museum, as well as the endless boutiques of Ku'damm and an array of great restaurants on Kantstrasse. Price room-only doubles from £180 Restaurant mains from £22 Family-friendly YAccessible Y Paul Sullivan was a guest of Roomers Berlin ( • Best affordable hotels in Berlin• Berlin v Munich: which is better?
Local Germany
18-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Local Germany
Eight art galleries you have to visit in Germany this year
There's a reason people love visiting art galleries - and Germany has some of the very best. Make time to spend an hour or two surrounded by vast sculptures or intimate canvasses this summer, let your thoughts drift on a sea of unexpected colours, and delight in the human urge to create. We've selected our pick of the best shows to visit this year, guaranteed to help you see the world from a new perspective. Katharina Grosse, Wunderbild: Deichtorhallen, Hamburg until September 14th Over 60 metres long, Katharina Grosse's show " Wunderbild " consists of massive, painted fabric panels suspended from the ceiling of a vast, repurposed market hall. The colour, form and sound (music by Stefan Schneider) combine to create an immersive experience which will leave all your senses feeling like new. The show takes place in Hamburg's monumental "Deichtor halls", originally constructed between 1911 and 1913, and combining steel-and-glass architecture to create a rare example of early 20th-century industrial design incorporating both Jugendstil and modernism. The artwork CHOIR (2025) by German artist Katharina Grosse as part of the Messeplatz project at Art Basel 2025. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/Keystone / Georgios Kefalas Stress test. Art between politics and society: Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin until September 28th As Berlin's foremost institution for twentieth-century art, the Neue Nationalgalerie has a collection to die for, offering a deep dive into some of the strangest (and darkest) corners of recent history as well as a window into what's happening today. The gallery's current blockbuster exhibition shows off the collection perfectly. Running until September 28th, Zerreißprobe represents a major exploration of the relationship between art, politics and society since the end of World War Two. Bringing together works from East and West Germany, key pieces from Western Europe and the USA, globally recognised legends, and artists who've been unjustly forgotten, the exhibition demonstrates the way in which artists have navigated ideological extremes, censorship, and utopian dreams – and created work which has shaped society in its turn. Zerreißprobe features work by Joseph Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Bridget Riley, Francis Bacon, Rebecca Horn, Bruce Nauman, Andy Warhol, and many others. Advertisement Five Friends, Cy Twombly and friends: Museum Brandhorst, Munich until August 17th Munich's Brandhorst Museum has one of the world's most extensive collections of work by the American artist Cy Twombly (1928–2011), a giant of twentieth century art whose incorporation of ideas from ancient art into contemporary modernist practices has influenced everyone from Anselm Kiefer to Julian Schnabel and Jean-Michel Basquiat. READ ALSO: What's the best way to travel between Berlin and Munich? This summer, the museum's permanent collection is joined by ' Five Friends ', an exhibition exploring the circle of friends who had such a decisive and interconnected influence on post-war art in the fields of music (John Cage), dance (Merce Cunningham), painting (Jasper Johns), sculpture (Robert Rauschenberg) and drawing (Cy Twombly himself). Yoko Ono, Music of the Mind: Gropius Bau, Berlin until August 31st Gropius Bau's summer blockbuster show is dedicated to the legendary Yoko Ono, a pioneer of conceptual art whose work transcends genres and generations. " Music of the Mind " brings together more than 200 artworks, including installations, scores, films, and participatory pieces, emphasizing Ono's enduring commitment to peace, imagination, and collective activism. Advertisement The Gropius Bau—one of Berlin's most iconic exhibition venues with a history of staging ambitious cross-disciplinary projects—underscores the artist's radical legacy by inviting visitors to become part of the art-making process themselves. Irma Stern, zwischen Berlin und Kapstadt: Brücke-Museum, Berlin from October 18th 2025 – February 15th 2026 This autumn, the renowned Brücke-Museum spotlights German-South African artist Irma Stern , whose vibrant work forms a bridge between African and European modernism. READ ALSO: Eight amazing German museums to explore this summer Stern, who moved between Berlin and Cape Town, painted lush still lifes, portraits, and landscapes which pulse with colour, energy, and a cross-cultural sensibility rarely seen in twentieth-century art. The Brücke-Museum itself, set in a luminous pine grove in Berlin's Dahlem district, is famous as the home of the Brücke artists – the original bad boys of German Expressionism – whose canvases remain permanently on view. Eager to paint the world as they thought it should be, the Brücke artists employed bright, non-naturalistic colours and a deliberately crude drawing technique. Der Blaue Reiter, A new language: Lenbachhaus, Munich until early 2026 The Lenbachhaus in Munich, home of 'Der Blaue Reiter'. Photo: picture alliance/dpa / Felix Hörhager While the Brücke artists were causing scandals in the north of Germany, the artists of the Blue Rider were doing the same in the south – and the Lenbachhaus in Munich has comfortably the world's most comprehensive collection of their work. Similarly preoccupied with the challenges of depicting inner truth instead of outer appearances and employing non-natural colours and perspectives, the Blue Riders spent far less time than their northern contemporaries defending their rights to indulge in group nudity and casual sex – which may be part of the reason they rank among the most influential artistic collectives the world has ever seen. The permanent collection in Munich, enhanced by a rich program of rotating exhibits exploring different aspects of the group's legacy, is housed in a historic villa and contemporary annex. Forgotten Avant-Garde – Queer Modernism and Julie Mehretu: Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf from September 20th, 2025 – February 15th 2026 (K20) & May 10th – October 12th, 2025 (K21) Düsseldorf's Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen boldly foregrounds diversity and trailblazing creativity in two landmark shows in 2025. " Forgotten Avant-Garde – Queer Modernism " at K20 rediscovers the LGBTQ+ pioneers whose creative energy shaped the modernist movement but who were often left out of mainstream narratives. Over at K21, Julie Mehretu's major solo exhibition presents her vast, dynamic paintings suffused with movement, migration, and urban complexity—a visual language that speaks directly to our globalized era. READ ALSO: Are these the 'best' bars in Germany? Both venues, famed for their stunning architecture and rotating displays from a world-class permanent collection (featuring Klee, Kandinsky, Bacon, and more), exemplify why Düsseldorf is a must-visit destination for contemporary and modern art lovers. ART COLOGNE: Koelnmesse, Cologne November 6th – 9th, 2025 Not a traditional gallery or museum exhibition but Europe's longest running and most influential art fair, ART COLOGNE is open to collectors, connoisseurs, and curious members of the public alike. For four days in November, Cologne's giant Koelnmesse will become a buzzing international meeting point, with about 200 top galleries presenting the newest, boldest, and rarest works in painting, sculpture, photography, digital art, and installations. Advertisement What truly sets ART COLOGNE apart is its unique blend of the commercial and the curatorial. Visitors can view, discuss, and acquire art directly, keeping an eye out for world-renowned artists and tomorrow's avant-garde. Special exhibitions round out the experience, creating an atmosphere that simply can't be duplicated in a traditional museum or gallery setting.
