Berlin Wall Foundation

Main Location:
Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer
Bernauer Straße 111
13355 Berlin
Germany
 
Second Location:
Erinnerungsstätte Notaufnahmelager Marienfelde
Marienfelder Allee 66/80
12277 Berlin
Germany
 
Contact:
Tel. +49 (0) 30 467986666
Fax +49 (0) 30 467986677
 
Opening Hours (Both Locations):
Tuesday to Sunday 10 am – 6 pm
Closed on Mondays
 
Admission is free.
 
Description: 

The Foundation encompasses two locations. The Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum is the museum of flight and emigration in divided Germany. The museum, in the former refugee center's main building, documents the history of emigration between the two German states. Also located at a historic site, the Berlin Wall Memorial describes the history of Berlin's division and provides information on historical and political contexts, as well as showing how the Wall and border regime functioned. It is a site for personal mourning, collective memory, historical education and reflection.   

Cold War Interests: 

| Permanent Exhibitions

Berlin Wall Memorial: "1961 | 1989. The Berlin Wall"

On November 9, 2014, the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Wall, the new permanent exhibition "1961 | 1989. The Berlin Wall" opened in the memorial's renovated documentation center.

The exhibition, covering 420 square meters, is dedicated to the history of Berlin's division. It explains the political and historical situation that led to the Wall's construction, its fall, and the reunification of Germany. Why was the Wall built? Why did the Wall stay up so long? Why did it fall in 1989? These questions are the focus of the multimedia exhibition that contains numerous artifacts, biographical documents and audio-visual media. The exhibition connects the history of political events with social history, showing how the brutal division of the city affected the people.

 

Marienfelde Refugee center: "Flight in divided Germany"

With its permanent exhibition covering the years 1949 to 1990, the Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum invites you to discover the history of Germany's post-war division and the accompanying inner-German movement of peoples. The exhibition is housed in what was the main building of the former refugee center. Located here were waiting rooms for the refugees and ethnic German emigrants, as well as offices for the agencies involved in the reception procedure.

Covering roughly 450 square meters with more than 900 objects, supplemented by eyewitness accounts, the exhibition vividly describes the reasons for leaving, escape routes, as well as the opportunities and problems associated with a new start in West Germany. In addition, visitor learn about the history of the reception center from its beginnings to the present-day: from the course of the reception procedure to the everyday life of the residents, right up to surveillance carried out by the East German secret police, the Stasi. A refugee apartment, furnished with original objects from that time, completes our presentation of escape in divided Germany.

The spectrum of topics addressed in the permanent exhibition is regularly enlarged upon in special exhibitions.