Say HI to Potsdamer and Leipziger Platz!
Cities are almost living entities, constantly shifting and transforming over the decades and centuries. They grow, shrink, and adapt, with the old giving way—whether torn down, burned down, or bombed out—to make room for the new. Each era breathes fresh cultural energy into the streets, reshaping not just how cities look but how they feel and function. Berlin doesn’t just follow this pattern—it practically redefines it, standing as perhaps Europe’s most dramatic example of (constant) reinvention. For a front-row view of transformation in action, visit Potsdamer Platz and its counterpart, Leipziger Platz, just across the road.
The Shaping of Potsdamer and Leipziger Platz
Both squares have been completely reimagined since the fall of the Berlin Wall, emerging as showcases of modern Berlin. In many ways, what the Communist DDR aimed to accomplish with Alexanderplatz and the medieval city center—a bold reinvention to reflect their political vision—the modern unified Germany sought to achieve here at Potsdamer Platz. It’s a sweeping rebuild, designed to embody contemporary ideas of what Berlin could and should be.
For all that this corner of Berlin looks and feels like a very thin slice of London or New York, cut off and transplanted here, the modern skyscrapers are built on a fascinating bit of historical real estate. Let’s get an birds-eye view of what that means. The Custom´s Control Wall
Along the City’s Customs Control Wall
The most important thing to notice at the outset is that the Brandenburg Gate is located a few hundred meters down Friedrich Ebert Strasse from Potsdamer Platz. The road passes by today’s Holocaust Memorial, and before entering Potsdamer Platz itself. This road marks the location of the city’s old Custom’s Control Wall, essentially marking the limits of the city in the 1730s. The Brandenburg Gate was just one opening in this wall, the next one was down was at, you guessed it, Potsdamer Platz, where the gate there was named the Potsdamer Tor, or Gate. When you look into Leipziger Platz, you’ll notice it has an octagonal shape. The square behind every gate in Berlin had a different shape; take a look at Pariser Platz behind the Brandenburg Gate and you’ll see it’s a rectangle.
Inside and Outside the City’s Customs Control Wall
What this means is that Leipziger Platz lay technically inside the city walls, and Potsdamer lay outside the walls. Leipziger Platz developed in the 18th century as a well-ordered expression of late Baroque city planning, while its sister square outside the gate remained more chaotic. These shapes and the associated road courses are almost all the remains of the original squares.
Leipziger Platz was fasionable and bourgeois
By the 19the and early 20th centuries, Leipziger Platz had become a fashionable place to see and be seen. It represented good old fashioned bourgeois values, and featured upmarket places like Wertheim’s department store. It represented dignity, pride and the growing wealth of the city.
Potsdamer Platz was free-spirited and modern
Potsdamer Platz, in contrast, was the unruly, free-spirited sibling of Leipziger Platz. Located outside the city walls, it symbolized a more unrestrained, hedonistic side of life. This square developed as a convergence point for multiple roads leading into the city through Leipziger Tor and Platz. It became the place to let loose, indulge, and have fun before stepping back into the city proper. By the 1920s, it became a byword for modernity and excess.
Golden Era for Potsdamer Platz was the Roaring Twenties
The roaring 1920s were arguably the Golden Era of the city and especially of Potsdamer Platz. The city could be seen here in all its frenetic energy. The customs wall had long vanished and Potsdamer Platz become quite possibly the busiest intersection in the world for a brief moment in the 1920s. Europe’s first traffic light was installed here, and a replica can still be seen there today. Traffic jams became a regular feature of the Platz, and its possible the modern concept of the car-caused traffic jam was born here. (although in fairness, cities have been suffering from traffic jams since antiquity, albeit it by horses and carts).
Haus Vaterland and History of «Erlebnisgastronomi»
Had you visited the platz in those legendary years, you could have popped into the Haus Vaterland, a veritable pleasure palace with the latest entertainments. Housed in an imposing building, it featured themed restaurants representing various countries, each offering unique cuisines and atmospheres, such as a Bavarian beer hall and a Spanish flamenco venue. The complex also boasted a cinema, dance halls, and a rooftop terrace, making it a one-stop destination for leisure and a certain mid to low brow culture. Haus Vaterland was a magnet for locals and tourists alike, and reports of what on there, savory or otherwise, are legion.
Café Josty was meeting place for the City’s artists, writers, and intellectuals
Not far from the Haus was the equally famous Café Josty, a renowned meeting place for the city’s artists, writers, and intellectuals. Known for its elegant atmosphere, it served as a hub for creative minds and bohemian culture during the vibrant Weimar era in the 20s. It had an outdoor seating area and large windows which offered views of the square, making it fertile ground for gossip and inuendo, a place to take the pulse of the city. Frequented by poets, journalists, and avant-garde thinkers, Café Josty helped shape Berlin’s reputation as a cutting edge, and edgy, sort of town.
Surrounding all these were a series of grand hotels, with guests ranging from the Kaiser himself who before the First World War hosted gentlemen’s evenings in one of them, to seedy places taking anybody with cash for a cheap room. Bringing people into the city in large numbers was the task of the great old Potsdamer Bahnhof, one of the city’s busiest rail terminals.
And so there we have the essence of the late 19th century and early 20th century in a nutshell, represented here in Potsdamer Platz. To be considered «on the map» in those years, a city had to have a large railway station with connections across the continent, a series of grand hotels nearby for guests to stay in, and large department stores for them to shop at. Those were the markers of urban success from the 1870s onward. When you add in the bohemian atmosphere of the place, with its high art theaters all the way down to the variety acts and dance venues, its easy to see how Potsdamer Platz became almost synonymous with hedonism and the spirit and energy of Berlin at its height.
Today however all that, and much more indeed, has entirely vanished, save for the tiniest of remnants. The famous Cold Wall era Wall ran right through here (for a few hundred meters, it ran practically along the course of the old 18th century wall) and the bulk of Potsdamer Platz became the kill zone between the inner and the outer walls which together formed «The Wall.» Much of this area had been badly damaged in the war anyway, but by 1961 virtually all traces of its existence had been wiped from the face of the earth.
After the Reunification – Rebirth Atemt of Potsdamer Platz
After reunification, the city made an enormous attempt to bring life back into what had once upon a time been the liveliest of Berlin’s squares. It has once again become synonymous with traffic jams and there is a train station here as well, buried deep underground this time. But to me, the result feels a bit artificial, as if the modern city were somehow trying too hard to force life back into a place it had once grown so naturally and energetically. But I’ll leave it there for now—I wouldn’t want to spoil your own first impressions! Take your time to soak in this
uniquely modern yet deeply historic spot in the heart of the German capital.
