Prenzlauer Berg

On Monday Jake and I moved into our new flat in Prenzlauer Berg. It's not far from our old place in Friederichshain - about a 10 minute bike ride across Friedrichshain Volkspark. It's a fantastic flat! It's at the top of an old style East German building (5th floor walk-up!) and gets amazing light. This is a huge improvement over the last flat; even though it was in a great neighborhood, it was on the ground floor and in the back corner of a gloomy building currently undergoing renovations. Yeah. So anyway, I love love LOVE the new digs!

This is our building; our flat includes the balcony and the three windows to the right:

The view from our bedroom window (you can also see the drastic difference in weather in these pics - those first 2 were taken Wednesday when it was raining; the blue skies are from today):

There is a playground directly across the street. It's actually part of an elementary school that is hidden behind the trees:

... and here's the view to the left:

And how crazy is this - our building still uses coal heating. Both bedrooms in the flat have honest-to-god coal burning stoves. Apparently this is still very common is some of the most popular areas of Berlin!

It was so cold on Tuesday that we had to fire it up for the night. It was fun, and surprising warm and cozy - sort of like sleeping around the campfire. Though I'm sure the novelty would wear off rather quickly in the dead of winter...

Anyway, click through to see (lots!) more pics of our new neighborhood!



Prenzlauer Berg is known for being a great neighborhood full of cafes, shops, and gorgeous architecture. Whereas Friederichshain could be compared the Mission district, Prenzlauer Berg is much more cutesy and family friendly. The following pictures are from Sredzkistrasse, which is a wide boulevard full of buildings with beautiful balconies, tree-lined cobblestone walks, and quintessential European sidewalk cafes on every corner. It's incredibly charming.

More pictures on the way!