And for the first time in a long time I was compelled to throw open the windows. These pottery shards -- chosen out of a basket from my beloved Jutta Altenstein's Ackerstraße workshop -- fluttered in the gust of wind.
Jutta Altenstein Werkstatt, Ackerstr. 18, Berlin-Mitte (map)
Open M-F 2pm-6pm
Astonishing to find a forest so close to home! I'll tell you more about the Schönholzer Heide tomorrow.
One could do far worse than spend a drizzly afternoon visiting the temple and strolling through the forest behind the Buddhist House in Frohnau. What were those monks having for lunch? It might be worth doing a retreat just to get a taste of the Sri Lankan home cooking.
Das Buddhistische Haus, Edelhofdamm 54, Berlin-Frohnau (map)
Open daily 9am-6pm (the library is shut on Mondays)
Wünsch' Dir Was has the best wooden toys, and Ursula Wünsch is such a charmer! I can't wait until S is old enough to join one of her creative afternoon courses.
I love the hand-sewn binding on the latest issue of Balkon & Garten. (Those in Berlin can swing by Do you read me?! to take a peek.)
It kills me that I didn't have a blog when I moved to Berlin some nine years ago. Berlin Reified prompts me to notice, to photograph, to record. I did less of that then, and now, what I wouldn't do for a picture of the pocked facade at Oranienburger Straße 2, where I spent, perhaps, the happiest spring of my life, living in a room sub-sublet from the man who would go on to found Dr. Pong. And how I would like just one image of the crumbling brickwork at Gleimstraße where, one day, a brick dislodged itself and fell onto a passer-by, prompting a visit from the police.
It's not just the absence of a blog that stilled my hand, of course. Susan Sontag was right. I hesitated to photograph these places I loved because I hated to admit the transience of their beauty. To admit that facade was beautiful, to photograph it because I knew the scaffolding and the workmen were inevitable, would tempt fate, I feared, and would (I thought with some unreasonable superstition) hasten that pace of change.
You smirk, and the world smirked too. Now the facades are bright and neat, and my abstinence from photography failed to stay the renovations and gentrification that have rippled across the various streets where I lived. Instead I pore over photographs of places so recently changed and they wrench my heart, these photographs I could have taken. Slowly I realize each neighborhod has its lifespan, and I lift my head to fresh woods and pastures new.
I don't think to mention those places I found and delighted over so many years ago. Doesn't everyone know about RSVP? Yet working on my Berlin guide has meant revisiting old favorites while seeking out new treasures. Perhaps you don't know about RSVP, and would like to take a needle and pierce two points in a map of the world and bind them with a red string to connect yourself to that person you love above all else. RSVP is the place to find a postcard set, complete with needle and crimson thread, that will permit you to do this. The tidily designed shop is also stocked with Portuguese notebooks, Perugian woodcuts and exquisite little illustrations by Su-Pyo Lee.
RSVP, Mulackstr. 14 (map)
Open M-Sat noon - 7pm
Tel. (030) 280 94644
Such paradise to browse through a bookshop that appears to anticipate what you're interested in: everyday life as art, the home, extraordinary children's books, the changing face of a city, browns on urban theory, so much more.
pro qm, Almstadtstraße 48-50 (map)
Open M-Sat 10am - 8pm
Tel. 030.2472852-0
My kaa bag looked so fetching one sunny day on Arkonaplatz that I had to take a picture. I'm not the fancy bag sort generally, and can be pretentious enough to prefer the rumpled Stabi Plastiktüte, but after dawdling before Kathrin Engelke's shop window for years I finally caved. The only problem was choosing: Markian, Valerian, Gildo? Phillipus won out in the end.
kaa Berlin, Gaudystr. 4 (map)
Open M, Tu, Th & Fr 3-6pm
Tel. (0)30 34 66 42 90
Such a pleasure to browse through the carefully chosen treasures in meine Lieblingssachen: a child's desk, some aprons (above), three perfect vases. If it's precious, it's precious in the best way.
meine Lieblingssachen, Pappelallee 9 (map)
Tel. (030) 71 535 688
