photos: Fruit Salat Films and Weisse Maus.
Step into a time machine of the senses and transport yourself back a century to the “Goldener Zwanziger” or the Golden Twenties, of Weimar Berlin. Let yourself be intoxicated by the decadence of the smoky and sweet Berliner Luft, and pay homage to the legendary Weisse Maus. From the creative minds behind The House of Red Doors and some of Berlin’s finest performance artists, chefs, musicians, and sommeliers, comes Die Weisse Maus 2022.
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by Adri | Events, Food
photos: Gili Shani.
After Berlin clubs closed their doors to their worshippers during the ongoing global pandemic, many kink lovers who found their refuge in these sanctuaries had to get more creative to maintain their inner desires. The legendary KitKat pool had to be replaced by our bathtubs and our music in compliance with the Hausordnung. The nascent lockdown rules were getting tougher and the end of the tunnel was getting more blurry along the way.
During this difficult time, Gili Shani, the only person who was allowed to take photos at KitKat Club, photographed 250 people in their houses, who were willing to show their kink for his book Voyeur. Berlin. Kinky. He drove all around Berlin to capture these intimate moments inspired by the pre-pandemic kink scene. With a sexually suggestive front cover of a lower front tattoo that says “fuck”, the book is already promising. Through Shani’s lens, these domestic shots reflect nothing different from a moment in KitKat; a man in a harness kneeling before the camera and a domina ready to spank someone in another photo. After all, you can get the Berliner out of the club but you can not get the kink out of Berliners.
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by Burak | Books, Party, People, Photos
photos: Megan Auer.
Berlin is undoubtedly a hedonistic city. It’s known for its wild sex clubs, indulgent late-night food culture, excessive drinking, and the legalization of sex work. Despite this sinful reputation, sex workers in Berlin still face much of the same stigma they encounter elsewhere. Berlin Strippers Collective (BSC) is an organization of strippers living in Berlin, working to tell their stories through art and events, while always advocating and fighting for their ultimate goal: decriminalization. Read on…
by Adri | People, Stories
Shibari Study, photo: Viktor Herak.
Berlin is known for a lot of different things: the history and the wall, Berghain and techno, döner and currywurst, just to name a few. But two elements central to the culture in the capital are sex and art. These two intriguing aspects of life in Berlin perfectly unite in Shibari, a type of Japanese bondage that focuses on the aesthetics of the bound body. Although we’re in the middle of a pandemic and sex clubs and museums are closed, Shibari is a great way to satisfy your craving for something both kinky and creative. There are a number of organizations and instructors still offering workshops and courses about the art of Shibari during the pandemic.
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by Adri | People, Stories
When it comes to dating in Berlin, things are not quite as black and white as you imagine. There are all these different new ways of life and love we have come to accept here and it only proves the liberal spirit of the city we love so much,
But where are you on the spectrum of love? For our book Like A Berliner (which by the way makes for an excellent Christmas present – order it here!) we sat together with illustrator Sophia Halamoda and came up with a smart little game of questions and answers that will solve the riddle and define what dating type you are.
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by Frank | Products, Stories
photos: Gili Shani.
I first met Gili Shani when he took my photo on a Wednesday night three years ago in KitKat. It may seem ironic that one of the most famous sex clubs in the world has a photographer, but no evening by the pool would be complete without the sleek, black and white moments he conjures. Shani refuses to call himself an artist, instead insisting that he simply captures the atmosphere inside KitKat. His photos offer a taste of what happens within the fabled walls of the notoriously hedonistic space. However, his work simultaneously subverts the sexual nature of the nightclub, “What I do is documentary,” he says, “it has nothing to do with sex.”
I sat down with Shani at Alexander Platz for a coffee and chat about his time in Berlin, his work in KitKat and what he’s been up to during quarantine.
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by Adri | Party, People
Have you ever come out of the cinema and felt like the movie is still going on in your head? Last Saturday coming out of Futur Drei and riding my bike with my friends trough Kreuzberg, I envisioned how my own life had instantly become part of a movie. Let me tell you why.
“Futur Drei – No Hard Feelings” tells the story of Parvis, a young gay man living in Hildesheim with his parents who immigrated from Iran to Germany before he was born. While leading a life without worries, he is bored out by partying and fucking random dudes and is missing some sort of direction or passion or commitment.
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by Claudio | Movies
photos: Eylül Aslan.
Berlin’s dating scene is shaped by three important factors. First of all, mostly thanks to its kinky parties, Berlin is a city commonly characterized by a spirit of sexual liberation. Secondly, while it’s a popular choice for international expatriates, some see it as an ultimate destination, and others as a temporary stop. And finally, the notion of “finding yourself” in Berlin is used equally often as a synonym for deep soul-searching and as an excuse for flaky behavior.
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by Guest Author | Stories
photo: SCANROULETTE @herpeslabial_
The lockdown has really put a damper on the sexual expression of Berliners in a major way. Unless you are lucky to live with your partner or with a flatmate with benefits your sex life most likely had to take a back seat in the last weeks. No Tinder or Grindr dates, no hooking up in bars, no kinky adventures in Berlin’s nightclubs. You really have to get creative to get your sexual kicks these days or at least seek some inspiration on any sex toy site of choice.
Our friends from Pornceptual were struck really badly by the pandemic. Their parties are on hold until further notice, and the WHOLE festival which they co-organize has been canceled for this year. But like many creative people in the city, the quarantine has also created new ideas and opportunities for them to make the best of the situation. One of those ideas that recently saw the light of day is their new platform Isolation Porn which is an extension to their Pornceptual blog dedicated to artworks and creations that have been produced in response to the lockdown.
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by Frank | Art, Pandemic
It’s Sunday, we got nothing much to do, we’ve been stuck at home for weeks, we’re bored, and to be honest, we’re kinda horny. So we thought it might be about time to give you something juicy to occupy your mind (and potentially other parts). We haven’t had a lot of kinky blog posts in a while, and you know we’re quite sex-positive here at iHeartBerlin, so we wanna offer you a bit of entertainment here, and possibly on the following Sundays. The “Short Sunday” used to be a category on iHeartBerlin many many years ago where we presented short films and video clips we found extra cute, so now might be a good time to get back to this tradition.
We wanna start something with a little bit more depth, we thought. A friend of ours sent us a relatively new short film about the obsession of a certain type of masculinity. The film is not really related to Berlin, but it’s an interesting watch nonetheless. We did a bit of research and found four more short films (some of which are actually related to Berlin) that all deal with the topic of complex sexuality in different ways and we thought this would make a great little short film program. To our delight, these five films even cover a wide spectrum of sexual orientations, from straight to gay, lesbian and bi. Hurrah! So without further ado, we let you dive right into it:
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by Frank | Videos