7 Best Sights in Berlin, Germany

This 1-km (½-mile) stretch of concrete went from guarded border to open-air gallery within three months. East Berliners breached the wall on November 9, 1989, and between February and June of 1990, 118 artists from around the globe created unique works of art on its longest remaining section. One of the best-known works, by Russian artist Dmitri Vrubel, depicts Brezhnev and Honecker (the former East German leader) kissing, with the caption "My God. Help me survive this deadly love." The stretch along the Spree Canal runs between the Warschauer Strasse S- and U-bahn station and Ostbahnhof. The redbrick Oberbaumbrücke (an 1896 bridge) at Warschauer Strasse makes that end more scenic.

A sprawling arts and event space, Urban Spree includes an exhibition gallery, workshop, art store, beer garden, and outdoor food court. Largely focused on urban graffiti, photography, and street art, the space also hosts a number of Berlin's alternative events.

Some 115,000 graves make up Europe's largest Jewish cemetery, in Berlin's Weissensee district, near Prenzlauer Berg. Covering more than 100 acres, the grounds resemble a forest, with tall trees and large ferns; scattered throughout are tombstones and mausoleums in various states of repair. Wandering through them is like taking an extremely moving trip back in time through the history of Jewish Berlin. Men are required to cover their heads with a kippah, available at the entrance.

This former no-man's-land between East and West Berlin (the name translates to "Wall Park") was off-limits to the public from 1961 to 1989, when the Berlin Wall fell. After reconstruction, the area reopened as a rough-around-the-edges park in 1994; renovations completed in 2020 have given the park more green space and trees, plus a popular playground and skatepark. Today it's filled with hipsters, musicians, and tourists on sunny days and for the weekly Sunday flea market. It's also home to the hugely popular open-air Bearpit Karaoke Show, which runs Sunday afternoon from spring through late fall and attracts a boisterous mix of people of all ages.

Nicknamed the "Rotes Rathaus" (Red Town Hall) for its redbrick design, the town hall was completed in 1869. Its most distinguishing features are its neo-Renaissance clock tower and frieze that depicts Berlin's history up to 1879 in 36 terra-cotta plaques, each 20 feet long. Climb the grand stairwell to view the coat-of-arms hall and a few exhibits. The entrance is inside the inner courtyard.

Built immediately after World War II, this monument stands as a reminder of the Soviet victory over the shattered German army in Berlin in May 1945. The Battle of Berlin was one of the deadliest on the European front. A hulking bronze statue of a soldier stands atop a marble plinth taken from Hitler's former Reichkanzlei (headquarters). The memorial is flanked by what are said to be the first two T-34 tanks to have fought their way into the city.

The Kulturforum's Staatsbibliothek is one of the largest libraries in Europe, and was one of the Berlin settings in Wim Wenders's 1987 film Wings of Desire.