Pansy Presents Halloween 2023 at SO36

Pansy Presents Halloween 2023 at SO36

After doing her thing in the far West of Berlin for the past year, PANSY is back at it again in Kreuzberg at the iconic SO36 – a club with such a rich history reaching all the way back into the days of David Bowie and Iggy Pop. This month she is doing not one but two events there – the first one being her big Halloween spectacle that happened earlier this week and brought back some of her favorite drag performers and friends to the stage for some bloody fun.

PANSY’s Halloween events are truly legendary. Of course a lot of events and parties slap the word Halloween into their title these days, but let’s be honest, most of them will not diverge much from their regular program and not a lot of guests will really dress up for the occasion. It’s also not really in the spirit of Halloween to move the event conveniently to the weekend. It is, after all, a holiday on the 31st of October – for a reason.

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10s Across the Board: A Ballroom Showdown for the Trophy

10s Across the Board: A Ballroom Showdown for the Trophy

photos: Frank R. Schröder. 

The Berlin Ballroom Scene has been cooking something up over the past months that finally came to light this past weekend. With the event “10s Across the Board: A Ballroom Showdown for the Trophy” the local scene took a new format to the stage of Theater des Westens that has never been done before in Berlin. It proposes an alternative to classic Balls with their competitions and battles on the runway, elevating Ballroom from the underground to the limelight of the big theater stages of the city.

Two Ballroom Legends are behind this spectacle: Mother Leo from the House of Saint Laurent and Mother Ambrosia from the House of Gorgeous Gucci. They teamed up with Tingel Tangel – the new program at Theater des Westens – to create something truly unique and fantastic.

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ABSOLUT. Born To Mix – An Unforgettable Club Night at Æden

ABSOLUT. Born To Mix – An Unforgettable Club Night at Æden

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This Friday you can look forward to a very special party in one of our favorite clubs: The Swedish brand ABSOLUT will mix up the Berlin nightlife with Born To Mix on September 8 – literally. Because here not only extraordinary drinks are mixed, but also different creative ideas, scenes, and people are brought together in one place to create very special moments that you will not forget so quickly. If you’ve ever been to an ABSOLUT event, you’ll know that I’m not exaggerating.

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The Candella Ball: Devilish Bodies

The Candella Ball: Devilish Bodies

I have a confession to make: Besides my marriage to Berlin, I have an extra-marital affair with Medellin, Colombia. You know, it’s nice to stick your head outside of Berlin every once in a while to see what other cities are up to. And in that spirit, I want to share a party photo set with you I took in Medellin last weekend at the Candela Ball, so you also get to see what the queer party scenes in other major cities in the world look like.

I loved photographing at this drag ball. It was much like in the old days in Berlin when I took party photos regularly. One of the first parties I had to think of was the Blitz party that I captured many times. The costumes, the make-up, and the effort that was put in both by organizers and guests – it’s really something rare to find. This is what I found at the Candela Ball.

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How Berlin Knows Best How To Celebrate Life

How Berlin Knows Best How To Celebrate Life

Crack open a bottle of champagne while cleaning and then stick with the drink – groom your mind rather than soulless furniture. Or get stuck in a traffic jam, but sing at the top of your lungs throughout; ​​there are people who manage to turn dull, everyday situations into a party.

The gourmets of life are rarely those who impose themselves on others, rather, the loud-mouthed emptiness that does seem to be the constant shadow of those who manage to poison the most beautiful events with their sad and bitter opinions.

It is these people who rant over how ridiculous it is to spend savings on a single event, or what a waste it is to down that expensive wine on a regular Wednesday for no reason.

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Queer Joy at the Berlin Pride Parade

Queer Joy at the Berlin Pride Parade

The last weekend was full of queer joy for us with several pride parades and queer parties going on. It felt a bit like Christmas for the LGBTQIA+ community and there was something going on for every sub-group. This year, we not only visited the main pride on Saturday but also the Dyke* March on Friday and the Internationalist Pride that happened on Saturday evening at Hermannplatz. Both of these were pretty much in contrast to the main Pride parade, but nonetheless what stood out was the smiling faces and happiness of all the queer people who joined. And that makes us very happy. Because queer joy matters so much – it’s the rebellion, the antidote, the protest against discrimination, hate, prejudice, prosecution, and inequality.

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Rave the Planet: Together Again in the Streets of Berlin

Rave the Planet: Together Again in the Streets of Berlin

After a few years of preparation, and another year of delay due to covid, the first edition of the Rave the Planet parade finally took place last Saturday bringing back the magic of the iconic Love Parade to the streets of Berlin. Around 200.000 ravers from young to old came together along the track of the parade that lead from Ku’damm over Nollendorfplatz, Potsdamer Straße, Brandenburger Gate all the way over to the Siegessäule in Tiergarten. A caravan of 18 trucks filled with DJs, performers, and ravers made its way through town filling the air with the finest techno the city has to offer.

It was pretty incredible to witness this first edition, especially since I never went to the original Love Parade that took place in Berlin from 1989 to 2006. The energy in the city was incredible, the people were so ecstatic and it felt like seeing Berlin back to its old strength that we almost thought lost due to the last years.

For the first time, we also had the privilege to experience a parade from the perspective of a truck as our friends from Das Techno Team invited us onto their float. It was a really special pleasure to celebrate this event with their crew and performers. It also gave me the opportunity to capture the event in ways I never could before during big street parades. Check out our Instagram and Tiktok for our video recap. And below you’ll find out photo impressions.

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Discovering new Festivals: Dancing on the Beach at the Mallorca Live Festival

Discovering new Festivals: Dancing on the Beach at the Mallorca Live Festival

Festival Season is back on track after a long covid break. This year we would love to introduce you to some festivals in Europe that might not have been on your bucket list yet. The Mallorca Live-Festival promises beach fun and electronic music highlights far away from the ordinary.

While other years we like to feature festivals around or in Berlin, this year with new travel opportunities we wanted to look a bit further out of our usual geographic radius. That is why we got super excited about the upcoming invitation for the Mallorca Live Festival.

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Fantastic Playground Berlin Opening Recap

Fantastic Playground Berlin Opening Recap

As some of you already know we are right in the middle of our new group exhibition Fantastic Playground Berlin that you can still visit until Saturday at the Marcell von Berlin Flagship Store on Friedrichstraße 172. We have been planning this show for a long time now and we still can’t believe that it finally materialized, and it looks so much more amazing than we ever could have wished for.

 

This exhibition is really special to us because for the first time we had a theme that allowed us to create something like a retrospective of our work for iHeartBerlin for the past 15 years. Berlin is a playground of ideas – this has always been an important theme for us as we featured all these wonderful and inspiring projects from different creative scenes that make up Berlin. It’s so diverse and fun and colorful. To us, it’s the essence of Berlin and why this city is so special. It feels like everyone can find their space on this wild playground.

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The Pyramid Party is the new Crazy Drag Ritual Berlin Needs Right Now

The Pyramid Party is the new Crazy Drag Ritual Berlin Needs Right Now

Could you imagine going sober-raving with a bunch of alien-like drag queens in Oberschöneweide? Neither did I until I went to the Pyramid Party. 

I have had my fair share of strange things in Berlin in the last couple of years. Approximately 16 years ago I came to this city as a young and curious psychology student and did not imagine what a rollercoaster ride was expecting me and my body. Yet last February one particular event became one of the top special experiences: the Pyramid Party. Before this particular event repeats itself this weekend I would like to share with you my experience of the last time I went there. 

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