How to Read Architecture in Berlin
Berlin has 30 architectural styles represented in its built landscape. The city's history as a divided capital means you encounter sharp stylistic contrasts block by block. Here is what to look for when identifying the most prominent directions.
The most widespread style, with 37 buildings. Flat roofs, ribbon windows, open floor plans, and light-coloured rendered facades. In Berlin, Modernism spans from Weimar-era rationalism (Peter Behrens's AEG Turbine Factory, Gropius's Siemens City) through post-war civic buildings (Düttmann's Academy of Arts, Stubbins's House of Cultures of the World) to late Modernist housing. Look for structural clarity and the absence of ornament — the building's form expresses its function.
Raw exposed concrete left as the finished surface, with board-marked textures and deep-set windows. Berlin's Brutalism is concentrated in institutional and residential buildings: the Mäusebunker's stacked laboratory decks, the Corbusierhaus's massive slab, the Czech Embassy's sculptural volumes. In sacred architecture, Düttmann's St. Agnes church is the defining example — stripped-back concrete geometry that turns light itself into the primary material.
Post-reunification Berlin became a laboratory for contemporary architecture. Look for bold material choices (Sauerbruch Hutton's coloured facades), contextual integration (Chipperfield's James-Simon-Galerie bridging old and new Museum Island), and structural innovation (Max Dudler's Grimm Centre with its cascading reading terraces). These buildings often respond directly to Berlin's layered history.
Dramatic, sculptural forms that prioritise emotion over function. Angular, faceted surfaces and dynamic silhouettes. Berlin's examples include the Kreuzkirche with its jagged brick tower and the Church at Hohenzollernplatz — both pushing masonry into theatrical territory. Scharoun's Philharmonic also carries Expressionist DNA in its tent-like roof and asymmetric massing.
Geometric purity, steel-frame construction, curtain walls, and open plans. Berlin preserves key Bauhaus-adjacent works: the Horseshoe Settlement (Taut & Wagner) with its sweeping residential curve, the Bauhaus-Archiv designed by Gropius himself, and the Haus Lemke — Mies van der Rohe's last German commission before emigrating. Look for flat roofs, primary-colour accents, and industrialised building components.
