The Kurfürstendamm in Berlin

Around 450 years ago, the Elector of Berlin rode along the Kurfürstendamm to hunt in the Grunewald forest. Today, Berliners and visitors to Berlin stroll down the Ku'damm to shop, be inspired by trendy fashion brands and elegant luxury labels and take a detour to the capital's upmarket interior design shops;

Berlin's new musical hit!

It goes on! "Ku'damm 59 - The Musical" is the sequel to "Ku'damm 56" and tells the story of the four fearless Schöllack women who fight for emancipation and self-discovery in Berlin at the end of the 1950s.

Tickets & dates

Mehr erfahren

The Kurfürstendamm shopping experience: a carefree stroll and elegant shopping 

Start your walk on the Kurfürstendamm in a westerly direction at Berlin's Breitscheidplatz. From here, the approximately 3.5-kilometre-long boulevard leads to Rathenauplatz, where the villa district in Grunewald begins. But don't worry - your walk doesn't have to be that long. The most splendid shops can be found between Uhlandstraße and Olivaer Platz. 

The Kurfürstendamm officially begins at Breitscheidplatz, before which the street was called Tauentzienstraße. Incidentally, this leads eastwards to Wittenbergplatz, where the legendary Kaufhaus des Westens is located, the KaDeWe - probably the most famous department stores' in the capital. The Europa-Center, still located on the Tauentzienstraße side, is one of Berlin's oldest shopping centres with the Mercedes star visible from afar. 

Now walk down Kurfürstendamm in a westerly direction. Between Breitscheidplatz and Uhlandstraße you will find a wide range of shopping opportunities. Whether flagship stores and shops of well-known, upmarket brands such as Apple, Boss, Armani, Lacoste, Roeckl, Falke, Liebeskind, Marc O'Polo or trendy fashion chains such as H&M - here you will find everything you need for a good shopping trip and in between larger tourist restaurants, cafés and steakhouses.

Around the Uhlandstraße intersection, international and renowned interior and porcelain shops such as Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur KPM, Villeroy& Boch, Occhio, the exclusive design house for light, or even Zara Home. A few steps up Uhlandstraße and you will find elegant interiors and designer furniture from top brands on Kantstraße, at Living Berlin.

Elegance

Towards Olivaer Platz then pure high fashion: Immerse yourself more in the top-elegant mile of Kurfürstendamm with every step. The magnificent wide pavements are quieter and the tall historic building façades conceal sophisticated shop windows behind which designers and world-famous luxury labels seduce their discerning clientele with clothes, shoes, jewellery and accessories.

Here is a current selection:

• Karl Lagerfeld
• Longchamp
• Cartier
• Aigner
• Gucci
• Dior
• Chanel
• Tiffany
• Salvatore Ferragamo
• Balenciaga
• Brunello Cucinelli
• Chopard
• Rolex
• Zegna
• Louis Vitton
• Valentino
• Hermès
• Dolce&Gabbana
• Bottega Veneta
• Etro

Don't miss: the side streets of Kurfürstendamm

Don't forget to take a detour to the side streets of Kurfürstendamm and feel a touch of Parisian charm: Go on a discovery tour of Bleibtreustraße and Knesebeckstraße. The beautiful historic house facades with their magnificent entrances are a feast for the eyes in themselves. They are home to small, fine boutiques and shoe shops, jewellers and exquisite interior design stores. In between, you will find sushi bars, Indian curry and German or Austrian cuisine for lunch in between or an elegant dinner. In Knesebeckstraße, French specialities, Mexican street food and afterwards, the Coffee Bar serves coffee roasted in-house with milk foam acrobatics. 

Not far away is the beautifully designed Savignyplatz with its numerous cafés, restaurants and a bookshop specialising in art, film and culture, Bücherbogen - once the declared bookshop favourite of designer Karl Lagerfeld.

Culture and sights on Kurfürstendamm

Kurfürstendamm not only offers you an exquisite shopping world and numerous culinary delights, but also cultural experiences and famous sights.

At the beginning of the boulevard on Breitscheidplatz is the impressive Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtsniskirche with its special architectural history. Here you can stop off and find peace and quiet on hot or rainy days. Just next door, in the Europa Centre, Berlin's oldest cabaret Die Stachelschweine invites you to a hilarious evening with plenty of subtle humour. Behind the Gedächtniskirche is the Bikini Berlin, the legendary cinema Zoo Palast and the luxury hotel Waldorf Astoria. Just behind it is the Tiergarten for the whole family to relax in, Berlin's green lung, with the Zoo Berlin.

An interesting example of contemporary architecture is the curved Ku'damm-Eck on the corner of Joachimsthaler Straße. In the opposite Kranzler Eck, the chairs of the historic Café Kranzler stood on the pavement until it was rebuilt in 2000. Today, the red and white striped awning still adorns the rotunda of Neues Kranzler Eck.

The cabaret theatre Die Stachelschweine is by no means the only stage on Kurfürstendamm. Around two and a half kilometres away on Adenauerplatz, Kurfürstendamm is home to one of Berlin's most important, internationally renowned theatres, the Schaubühne. With its gripping productions and top actors, it continues to write theatre history.

A little way from Kurfürstendamm you will find the Stage Theatre of the West. Today you can experience exciting musical highlights on this grand stage in a magnificent Wilhelminian building on Kantstraße, which has been in existence for more than a hundred years.

At a glance

And last, but not least: A look back at the history of the Kurfürstendamm

Kurfürst Joachim II. of Brandenburg had a causeway built behind the Brandenburg Gate around 1542 as a bridle path from the Berlin City Palace to the Grunewald Hunting Lodge . The oldest evidence of the existence of the unnamed bridleway is the "Plan géométral de Berlin et des environs" by the engineer La Vigne in 1685. It was not until 1886 that the road was completed and the development of the boulevard could begin.

The birthday of the boulevard is considered to be 5 May 1886 - the day on which the steam tram line Zoologischer Garten - Halensee began its service.
In the 1920s, Kurfürstendamm was the centre of the New West, where poets, journalists and intellectuals met in the Romanisches Café (today the Europa-Center is located here) and the Café des Westens (later Café Kranzler).

At the time of the Berlin Wall, Kurfürstendamm was the heart of old West Berlin, the shop window of the West, with the latest fashions on display in its showcases. Hildegard Knef sang about Kurfürstendamm as a place of longing in her Berlin song: "Ich habe so Heimweh nach dem Kurfürstendamm". At these times, Berliners and guests stroll along the boulevard, sit in the famous Kranzler and Möhring street cafés, stroll through shops and department stores and dance the night away in the discos.  
After reunification, the evenings on Kurfürstendamm and in City West became quieter as nightlife shifted to the districts in the east, where the new clubs opened. Many of the long-established cafés and restaurants closed. Of the more than 20 cinemas that once existed, two still remain today: the Cinema Paris in the Centre Français and the Astor Filmlounge.

However, the upswing in City West in recent years with the new Zoo Palast and the Bikini has also benefited Kurfürstendamm, which has once again developed into an elegant shopping mile.

Guided tours through the City West

Tickets for guided tours

Join a small group on a guided tour through the City West: On the tour, you will learn exciting stories about the Kudamm and discover hidden places at the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church.

Tickets for individual city tours

A little tip:

Look out for the house numbers on Kurfürstendamm. You will search in vain for numbers 1 to 10, they no longer exist. They have been part of Budapester Straße since the 1920s.

The secrets of Berlin