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Gotta Catch ’em All! Pokémon Go in Berlin

photo: iHeartBerlin

Maybe it’s a bit of a secret, but some of us are actually nerds just hiding in cool clothes. We might really prefer a Pokéball in our hands (or maybe the playcards or Nintendo DS) than a Club Mate or rollie cigarette. Perhaps it’s been a while since the classic Pokémon universe has been a serious fascination for most of us (unless you count the Rick & Morty smartphone game Pocket Mortys – an awesome homage to Pocket Monsters with the great characters and humor of the Adult Swim show!), but a new phenomenon now arrives in Berlin: Pokémon GO!

How to find the closest Späti in Berlin

by Frank | Products

photo: Robert Agthe / CC

The Spätis are as much of a trademark for Berlin as the TV tower or the Berliner Bear. The quirky little shops full of bottles and some often weird selection of supermarket goods are all over the city and a lot of people (mostly those too lazy or to unorganized to go to the next real supermarket) live off of these shops. Lately the beloved Spätis have been endangered by new laws that want to prohibit their Sunday opening hours and the beer benches in front of the popular late-night and after hour hang-outs. Who ever came up with these new laws: Shame on you! You are destroying one very great part of Berlin.

But here is a fun new project that celebrates the Spätis like they should be. It’s a new app developed by Clemens Morris that let’s you search the closest Späti near you. It’s really cool, especially if you are not in your own neighborhood or when you are new in town. If you walk by a Späti that hasn’t been listed yet, you can also submit one yourself or repost a closed one.

Berlin Design Highlights 2016

by Claudio | City Guide, Products

This upcoming weekend is all over the radar of design. Multiple happenings lure product and fashion designers from all over the world to our beloved city. Design has become an important creative field in this city – 10 years ago, making a living in the creative industry was fairly impossible. Nowadays tons of small studios, ateliers and design manufactures build businesses in town. This weekend not only do you have the chance to visit the spaces of these small studios, but you can also discover international design coming to Berlin for the DMY fair. This and three other design highlights in our little design guide for the weekend.

aviv – A New Magazine from Berlin in German and Hebrew

by Claudio | Products

photo: Christian Werner

Independent print magazine projects seem like a relic from another era. Of course print magazines look great as accessories on Instagram pictures and on our coffee tables. But is there still the habit of READING things on paper? Well maybe the habits are changing but the curiosity and the openness to a diversity of experiences is not. So even though I think more and more people will read and consume all kinds of content on digital surfaces, others will still cherish the experience of reading on paper. Maybe it is the crisis of print publishing that pushes journalists and makers to think of magazine concepts that dare more than ever and explore new possibilities.

aviv is a new magazine made in Berlin that dares with something really unconventional. Printed in Hebrew and German, the bilingual print-magazine focuses on literature and the arts and wants to renew the relationship between the two languages and cultures. For me, having been in love with languages and their power of identification all my life, this project is a good example of building creative bridges. Publishing from a young and autonomous perspective, the founder Hanno Hauenstein and his co-editor Itamar Gov focus on less illuminated content between these languages, and highlights the underlying historical and political complexities. I think that especially here in Berlin such a project is very important to create a dialogue between Israelis and Germans living here.

Tonight on Mai 13th aviv is celebrating the launch party of their first Issue at Berghain Kantine with numerous acts, dance performances and a reading. Don’t miss it. Some impressions of the magazine and the two creators after the jump.

Exploring Berlin: 24h in Friedrichshain

by Alicia | Bars, Cafés, Friedrichshain, Galleries, Products, Restaurants, Shops

photos: Alicia Kassebohm

Especially when we are overwhelmed with work, when something significant changes in our life, or when we simply leave our usual surroundings to a new place, this is when we notice our most valuable asset: time.

In Friedrichshain you have time to get lost, as well as time to find something you didn’t know you were looking for. It is a place for nostalgia, for living in the moment, but also for seeking the future. It is an unfinished place, where one of time’s most significant effects becomes very obvious: change.

You definitely notice that unfinished character just by walking down Warschauer Straße, seeing all the construction works, graffiti and improvised shops and galleries. It’s always in progress, always changing. But this is what makes it special, what makes all of Berlin special.

The new label Lilienthal Berlin wants to capture exactly this spirit with their brand new watch, representing the individualistic and unique character of the city that is always in between a state of tranquility and movement. The iconic design symbolizes both the diverse history, but also its colorful present and future with subliminal details and aesthetic quotes of the city. With the exchangeable leather wristbands and color options of the body and face, it is adaptable to its wearer as the city itself.

To celebrate the launch of today’s exclusive pre-sale of their first model – the Lilienthal Berlin L1, which comes in a limited edition of 1440, all designed in Berlin and manufactured in Germany – the label sent us on a 24h tour to explore our favorite places in Berlin. We took the watch with us on our way through Friedrichshain, always with the time on our side. Enjoy our highlights after the jump!

Spirits of Berlin

by Kate | Products

Brandstifter Berlin

Berlin is a party capital and when people party they drink alcohol. The logical consequence: a lot of alcohol is being consumed in our city. Berlin wouldn’t be the same if it wasn’t for some of the unique spirits that are produced here. Yes, you will probably have a hard time finding the Peppermint Schnaps Berliner Luft or the beautifully simplistic Our/Vodka Bottle somewhere outside of the city, even though they enjoy a good and very unique image around the world.

The most important spirts of Berlin after the jump…

Berlin Goods: Furniture & Accessories from Nutsandwoods

by Frank | Design, Products

photos: ourfoodstories

Making furniture has always been a dream job for me. My dad is quite handy when it comes to working with wood, he learned a lot from his father who was a carpenter, and so he also taught a couple of things to me. I think it was a pleasure for him to see that I picked up on it and it gives him great joy to give me tools and machines for Christmas. In fact, even without having studied design or going through a practical education, I have designed and built quite a few pieces of furniture and interior objects in my life. But I never turned it into my main profession. Shame, really.

It comes naturally that I have always admired people who make furniture. There is something fundamentally sexy about creating something beautiful with your hands from raw materials. Of course the character of Aidan from cult TV show Sex and the City, the heart-throbbing furniture designer that the main character Carrie has dated over the course of a couple of seasons, has added to the idolized prototype of a furniture maker.

When I discovered the furniture label Nutsandwoods from Berlin and read the story of its founder Philipp Roessler I felt a similar sense of admiration. Here is a man who had a plan: I want to make a table of raw, natural materials that will last longer than a life and that looks super cool and timeless. (Goes and makes such table. Bam!) He basically only wanted to make this table for himself, but with incoming requests from friends and acquaintances he started to produce more, went into serial production and added more furniture designs such as benches, couch tables, chairs, shelves, lamps and other smaller accessories to his portfolio. The label Nutsandwoods was founded and now, years later, he designs not only for people’s homes, but also for shops, showrooms and trade shows. As his latest addition to the collection he designed lounge chairs from steel and fine leather, a couch and a sideboard, all of which with his signature style and favorite material: local oak tree and steel.

You can find the designs from Nutsandwoods here in Berlin at Hallesches Haus.Go check it out!

3 Awesome Advent Calendars from Berlin

by Lia | Design, Products

Let’s be honest: it’s not easy to get out of bed on cold Winter mornings. But luckily December 1st is around the corner! Advent calendar presents will make us jump out of the sheets in excitement for our daily presents in the run up to christmas.

You don’t have a calendar yet? Well be quick and get yourself one of those twenty four day surprises! We chose some unique advent calendars for you, three from Berlin and an extra one from Hamburg. Enjoy our selection after the jump.

An Iconic Design Revisited

by Frank | Fashion, Products

photo: 13thwitness

The classic Converse Chuck Taylor, one of the most iconic sneakers of all time, is up for a reboot. Launched earlier this week, the new Chuck II comes as a high top and low cut in 4 different colors, with improved materials and functionality, turning this classic sneaker into a piece of contemporary footwear.

To celebrate the release, Converse teamed up with some of the world’s most creative visual artists and photographers to create artworks in the spirit of the new Chuck Taylor All Star II. After the jump you can see some of these.

Esther Perbandt amplified by Raumfeld

by Frank | Fashion, Music, Photos, Products

For a few years now the fashion shows by Berlin avant-garde designer Esther Perbandt have been not only about fashion but also about performance and music. For her 10th anniversary last year she had an experimental choir and an expressive dancer open her big show at the Volksbühne. The following season she herself stepped into the spotlight singing live for the first time during her fashion show. This season Esther once more created a bridge to the world of music and theater bringing in the opera singers Nadja Michael and Felix Räuber who were performing magnificently to the electronic soundscapes by Sven Helbig.

Of course such a music-driven fashion show requires a sound expert as a partner. Already for the second time Esther Perbandt has teamed up with the Berlin-based company Raumfeld that produces high quality wireless multi-room speaker systems that play music in true high fidelity thanks to the use of high-end audio components and the playback of lossless audio files. We featured the brand a while ago with an interview and store visit of their shop at Bikini Berlin and we also got to try out one of their impressive speaker sets. During the fashion show of Esther Perbandt we spotted several Raumfeld Stereo Cubes all over the place which we remember from our interview is one of their best reviewed products.

Some backstage impressions, the show review and photos of the new collection after the jump. Enjoy!

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