Hotel Adlon
Encyclopedia
Unter den Linden
Unter den Linden is a boulevard in the Mitte district of Berlin, the capital of Germany. It is named for its linden trees that line the grassed pedestrian mall between two carriageways....
, the main boulevard in the Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
city centre, directly opposite the Brandenburg Gate
Brandenburg Gate
The Brandenburg Gate is a former city gate and one of the most well-known landmarks of Berlin and Germany. It is located west of the city centre at the junction of Unter den Linden and Ebertstraße, immediately west of the Pariser Platz. It is the only remaining gate of a series through which...
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First Hotel Adlon 1907-1945
The first Hotel Adlon was built in 1907 by Lorenz AdlonLorenz Adlon
Lorenz Adlon was a German caterer, gastronomer and hotelier.-Early life:Lorenz Adlon was born at Mainz. His original name had been Laurenz. He was the sixth out of nine children of the shoemaker Jacob Adlon and his wife Anna Maria Elisabeth, who was an accoucheuse...
, a successful Berlin wine merchant and restaurateur. Adlon wanted to build his hotel on the Pariser Platz, at the heart of Berlin. He had Kaiser Wilhelm II personally intercede with the owners of the Palais Redern, a landmark designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel
Karl Friedrich Schinkel
Karl Friedrich Schinkel was a Prussian architect, city planner, and painter who also designed furniture and stage sets. Schinkel was one of the most prominent architects of Germany and designed both neoclassical and neogothic buildings.-Biography:Schinkel was born in Neuruppin, Margraviate of...
, which sat at Adlon's chosen location. The Kaiser cleared the way for Adlon's purchase of the Palais and its demolition.
The Adlon was one of the most famous hotels in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
between the two World Wars and hosted celebrities including Louise Brooks
Louise Brooks
Mary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, noted for popularizing the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...
, Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era. He became the most famous film star in the world before the end of World War I...
, Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
, Josephine Baker
Josephine Baker
Josephine Baker was an American dancer, singer, and actress who found fame in her adopted homeland of France. She was given such nicknames as the "Bronze Venus", the "Black Pearl", and the "Créole Goddess"....
and Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
. It was also a favorite hangout of journalists, located in the heart of the government quarter next to the British Embassy
British Embassy in Berlin
The British Embassy in Berlin is the United Kingdom's diplomatic mission to Germany. It is located on 70-71 Wilhelmstraße, near the Hotel Adlon. The current ambassador is Simon McDonald.- Palais Strousberg :...
, on the same square as the French and American Embassies and only blocks from the Chancellery and other government ministries.
The hotel continued to operate throughout World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, although parts were converted to a military field hospital
Field hospital
A field hospital is a large mobile medical unit that temporarily takes care of casualties on-site before they can be safely transported to more permanent hospital facilities...
during the final days of the Battle for Berlin. The hotel survived the war without any major damage, having avoided the bombs and shelling that had leveled the city. However, on the night of 2 May 1945 a fire started in the hotel's wine cellar by intoxicated Soviet soldiers left the main building in ruins.
East German Hotel Adlon 1945-1984
Following the war, the East German government reopened the surviving rear service wing under the Hotel Adlon name. The ruined main building and all of the other buildings on Pariser Platz were demolished. The square was left as an abandoned, grassed-over buffer with the West, with the Brandenburg Gate sitting alone by the Berlin Wall.In 1964, the remaining part of the building was renovated and the facade
Facade
A facade or façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning "frontage" or "face"....
was redone. However, in the 1970s what remained of the original Hotel Adlon closed to guests and was converted to a lodging house for East German apprentices. Finally, in 1984, the building was demolished.
Second Hotel Adlon 1997-Present
With the reunification of GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, the site was bought by a West German investment firm. A building loosely inspired by the original was designed and on 23 August 1997 the president of the Federal Republic of Germany opened the new Hotel Adlon, rebuilt on the same location as the original hotel. It currently operates as Hotel Adlon Kempinski Berlin, part of the Kempinski
Kempinski
Kempinski Hotels S.A. is a luxury hotel group. Kempinski Hotels, the trading name for Kempinski Hotels S.A., is an independent Swiss delisted S.A., which is involved in a number of luxury hotel and hospitality related businesses, including conference, catering and hotel supplies.Kempinski Hotels...
chain. Due to the hotel's success, it has been expanded twice, with new wings along the rear on Behrenstrasse. They are known as the Adlon Palais and the Adlon Residenz.
In Popular Culture
- Film director Percy AdlonPercy AdlonPercy Adlon is a German film and television director, screenwriter, and producer. He is best known for his film Bagdad Café aka Out of Rosenheim.-Biography:...
is the great-grandson of Lorenz Adlon and made a documentary about the hotel called The Glamorous World of the Adlon Hotel in 1996. - Much of the Liam Neeson action film "Unknown" was filmed at the Adlon, including the entire final portion.
- Greta GarboGreta GarboGreta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...
's 1932 film 'Grand Hotel' is set in a Berlin hotel inspired by the Adlon. In one of its rooms, she first utters her trademark line 'I vant to be alone'. - A fictional half-ruined pre-war luxury hotel in East Berlin (also inspired by the Adlon), is seen in Billy WilderBilly WilderBilly Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
's film One, Two, ThreeOne, Two, ThreeOne, Two, Three is a 1961 American comedy film directed by Billy Wilder and written by him and I.A.L. Diamond. It is based on the 1929 Hungarian one-act play Egy, kettö, három by Ferenc Molnár, with a "plot borrowed partly from" Ninotchka, a 1939 film co-written by Wilder...
. - The hotel features prominently in numerous fiction and non-fiction books about the Third Reich, including Joseph KanonJoseph KanonJoseph Kanon is an American author, best known for thriller and spy novels set in the period immediately after World War II.-Biography:...
's novel The Good German, Philip KerrPhilip KerrPhilip Kerr is a British author of both adult fiction and non-fiction, most notably the Bernie Gunther series of thrillers, and of children's books, particularly the Children of the Lamp series....
's Bernie Gunther novels, David DowningDavid DowningDavid Downing is a contemporary British author of mystery novels and nonfiction. His works have been reviewed by Publishers Weekly, the New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. He is known for his "convincing" depiction of World War II and Berlin, likely due to his studies and familiarity with...
's John Russell novels, and William L. ShirerWilliam L. ShirerWilliam Lawrence Shirer was an American journalist, war correspondent, and historian, who wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a history of Nazi Germany read and cited in scholarly works for more than 50 years...
's memoir Berlin DiaryBerlin DiaryBerlin Diary is a first-hand account of the rise of the Third Reich and its road to war, as witnessed by the American journalist William L. Shirer...
. - Michael JacksonMichael JacksonMichael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...
infamously dangled his son "Blanket" out one of the hotel's windows during a visit to Berlin in November 2002. - In the 1972 film CabaretCabaret (film)Cabaret is a 1972 musical film directed by Bob Fosse and starring Liza Minnelli, Michael York and Joel Grey. The film is set in Berlin during the Weimar Republic in 1931, under the ominous presence of the growing National Socialist Party....
, Liza MinnelliLiza MinnelliLiza May Minnelli is an American actress and singer. She is the daughter of singer and actress Judy Garland and film director Vincente Minnelli....
's character Sally Bowles says she went to "the Adlon" to meet her father, who did not show up. - In the Doctor WhoDoctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
episode "Let's Kill HitlerLet's Kill Hitler"Let's Kill Hitler" is the eighth episode of the sixth series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, and was first broadcast on BBC One, Space and BBC America on 27 August 2011. It is the second episode of a two-part story, continuing stories from "A Good Man Goes to War"...
", the TARDISTARDISThe TARDISGenerally, TARDIS is written in all upper case letters—this convention was popularised by the Target novelisations of the 1970s...
lands in the dining room of the Hotel Adlon in 1938, the DoctorDoctor (Doctor Who)The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....
dies there due to River SongRiver Song (Doctor Who)River Song is a fictional character played primarily by Alex Kingston in the British science-fiction series Doctor Who. River Song was introduced to the series as an experienced future companion of series protagonist the Doctor, an alien Time Lord who travels through time in his TARDIS...
's poisonous kiss and she uses her own regenerationRegeneration (Doctor Who)Regeneration, in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, is a biological ability exhibited by Time Lords, a race of fictional humanoids originating on the planet Gallifrey. This process allows a Time Lord who is old or mortally wounded to undergo a transformation into a new...
energy plus all her future regenerations to resurrect the Doctor, under the eyes of Amy PondAmy PondAmelia Jessica 'Amy' Pond is a fictional character portrayed by Karen Gillan in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
and Rory WilliamsRory WilliamsRory Williams is a fictional character portrayed by Arthur Darvill in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Having been introduced at the start of the 5th series, Rory joins the Eleventh Doctor as a companion in the middle of Series 5...
.