The Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer, or Berlin Wall Memorial, is an open-air commemorative site that stretches for over one kilometer along Bernauerstrasse.
This huge outdoor museum covers the period of nearly thirty years, from 1961 to 1989, during which the Wall split the city in two. The museum comprises all aspects of life in Berlin at the time of the Cold War between the USA and the Soviet Union, which began in 1947.
Along the route, you can see a stretch of the original Wall that has been restored; you’ll notice what were once the watchtowers, and you’ll have the chance to learn how the Wall was built, thanks to the images on what were once the border houses. There are a number of brass plates on the ground in memory of the fallen, as well as underground tunnels used as escape routes. Information panels and multimedia stations help relive the most important events that took place here.
At number 111 Bernauerstrasse, you’ll find the Documentation Center, which displays the permanent exhibition “1961/1989. The Berlin Wall”, inaugurated on November 9, 2014 on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Objects, documents and videos illustrate the entire history of this division that split the city in two for years, showing the impact the Wall had on everyday life on both sides.
Opposite the Documentation Center is the Denkmal, perhaps the most moving part of the memorial: an actual stretch of the Wall, some 70 meters long, sandwiched between two rusty iron slabs and part of a reconstruction of the complex that marked the border. The restoration work was carried out in 1998 by the German architects Kollhoff & Kollhoff.
Let me leave you with an interesting fact. One of the most strikingly emotional elements of the site is the Window of Remembrance, which projects the names and photographs of over 100,000 people who were killed trying to make it over the Wall in a desperate attempt to flee from the dictatorship in East Berlin. The victims included a six-year-old child.
