New Garden, Potsdam

The Marmorpalais (or Marble Palace) is a former royal residence in Potsdam, near Berlin in Germany, built on the grounds of the extensive Neuer Garten on the shores of the Heiliger See (lake). The palace was commissioned by King Friedrich Wilhelm II (Frederick William II of Prussia) and designed in the early Neoclassical style by the architects Carl von Gontard and Carl Gotthard Langhans. The palace remained in use by the Hohenzollern family until the early 20th century. It served as a military museum under communist rule, but has since been restored and is once again open to the public.

Cecilienhof Palace (German: Schloss Cecilienhof) is a palace in Potsdam, Brandenburg, Germany, built from 1914 to 1917 in the layout of an English Tudor manor house. Cecilienhof was the last palace built by the House of Hohenzollern that ruled the Kingdom of Prussia and the German Empire until the end of World War I. It is famous for having been the location of the Potsdam Conference in 1945, in which the leaders of the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States made important decisions affecting the shape of post World War II Europe and Asia. Cecilienhof has been part of the Palaces and Parks of Potsdam and Berlin UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1990.

Heiliger See (English: Holy Lake) is a lake within the city limits of Potsdam, Brandenburg, Germany, located northeast of the city center and bordering the historic park known as the New Garden. Together with the lakes Sacrower See and Groß Glienicker See to the north it forms a chain of lakes resulting from a glacial tunnel valley. The lake is 1.33 km long and 300 metres wide on average. Because of its picturesque location amidst the historic parks and palaces of Potsdam, with the Marmorpalais on its west shore and Cecilienhof near the north shore, the lake is a popular goal for excursions and has an attractive residential area on its eastern shore. On the north shore there are informal places for swimming and sunbathing, as well as a connection to Lake Jungfernsee and thus to the Havel River’s extensive network of waterways via the Hasengraben, a short canal where the water is kept dammed up to maintain a high water level for the lake. This is done to keep the wooden piles on which the Marmorpalais is built from being exposed to the air and drying out. The lake suffers from an overload of biomass, especially from falling leaves which are decomposed by bacteria on the shallow bottom, depleting the lake of oxygen in the process. In summertime the depths can be virtually without oxygen, causing dead ecological zones.

The KGB Prison at Leistikowstraße 1 in the German city of Potsdam was a detention centre run by the Soviet counter-intelligence organisation, SMERSH.

The Dairy in the New Garden was built to plans by the master builder, Carl Gotthard Langhans, on the shore of the Jungfernsee lake at the northernmost tip of the New Garden in Potsdam, Germany. Construction was carried out from 1790 to 1792 by Andreas Ludwig Krüger.In the course of laying out the landscape garden and building the Marble Palace under Frederick William II of Prussia, a dairy was built to supply the royal court. Cows grazing on the surrounding land produced milk for the manufacture of butter and cheese. In 1843/1844 Frederick William IV. had the building extended. To a design by the architect Ludwig Persius a second storey was added under the direction of Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse and the southwest corner was enhanced with a tower. Battlements run along the edges of the roof and give the building a Norman character. A second expansion was carried out in 1857 with the engine or pump house, which was built to water the New Garden. The high, slender chimney is part of that technical modification. The upper basin for the supply of water is nowadays located within the Belvedere on the Pfingstberg. In 1928 a restaurant was established in the building that became one of the most popular destinations for day trippers in Potsdam until the Second World War. Its occupation by the Red Army at the end of 1945 and the destruction by fire of part of the building ended its gastronomic function. The dairy was still in this ruined condition when the Berlin Wall was built in 1961. In 1991, after the Wende, renovation and restoration measures were carried out on the old building and, in 2003, it was able to re-open as a brewery and restaurant (Gasthausbrauerei).

Lepsiushaus is a house museum in Potsdam, Germany. Johannes Lepsius was a German humanist, philosopher, historian, and Armenian human-rights activist. Lepsiushaus is the house where he lived from 1908 to 1926.During the Cold War, this building in East Germany was abandoned. In 1998 the Ministry of Culture in Germany started the renovation of the building with the help of some private donations. The renovated Lepsiushaus was opened to the public as a "Research Center for Genocide Studies" in May 2011.

Located in Potsdam, Germany, the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) aims to identify and promote development pathways for a global transformation towards a sustainable society. The IASS employs a transdisciplinary approach that encourages dialogue to understand sustainability issues and generate potential solutions in cooperation with partners from the sciences, politics, the economy, and civil society. A strong network of national and international partners supports the work of the Institute. Its central research topics include the energy transition, emerging technologies, climate change, air quality, systemic risks, governance and participation, and cultures of transformation in the Anthropocene.

The Belvedere on the Pfingstberg (German: Belvedere auf dem Pfingstberg) is a large structure north of the New Garden in Potsdam, Germany, at the summit of Pfingstberg hill. It was commissioned by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia and built between 1847 and 1863 as a viewing platform. Because of its architecture and historical importance, the Belvedere forms part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Palaces and Parks of Potsdam and Berlin, inscribed in 1999.

The Alexander Nevsky Memorial Church is an historic Russian orthodox church in Potsdam, Germany. The church was built for the Russian residents of the settlement of Alexandrowka, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, below the Kapellenberg. Consecrated in 1826, it is still an active congregation and the oldest Russian Orthodox church in Germany. Designed by Vasily Stasov, Nevsky Church is a very early example of the Byzantine Revival architecture in Germany, and one of the earliest examples of Byzantine Revival in Russian Revival architecture.

The museum FLUXUS+ is located in Potsdam, Germany and opened in the city's new cultural centre Schiffbauergasse in April 2008. It is Potsdam's first museum of modern art. The 1000 sqm exhibition space of the two-storey building comprehends artworks from private collections. With its large art+life-shop, its café, an “atrium” for temporary exhibitions and events, the museum FLUXUS+ has become a cultural meeting point not only for artists and art-lovers. The permanent exhibition of the museum FLUXUS+ consists of artworks, documents and films of and about the international and intermedia art movement fluxus. On the ground floor, it features works of Wolf Vostell, Emmet Williams, Ben Patterson, Nam June Paik, and other artists of the 1960s. Besides, works of artists like Arman, Lebel, Christo, Niki de Saint-Phalle, Hains, Leve, and Ann Noël are presented in order to give a general idea of the avant-garde of the second half of the 20th century. The exhibits on the second floor of the museum focus on the art and lifework of Wolf Vostell. Here, rather the smaller art objects, sketches, and paintings than oversized works of Vostell reflect his motto “Leben ist Kunst. Kunst ist Leben”. The collection comprehends some of Vostell's earliest sketches as well as works that he completed shortly before his death, thus, illustrates his work as a fluxus-and happening-artist, designer, composer, painter, and video pioneer. Furthermore, the museum features today's interpretation of “Kunst ist Leben” by presenting the works of four contemporary artists: Costantino Ciervo, Hella De Santarossa, Lutz Friedel, and Sebastian Heiner.

The Royal Country House in Potsdam is situated on mount Kapellenberg and was originally constructed for the sexton of the Russian Orthodox chapel of Saint Alexander Nevsky nearby. The façade of the log house recalls simple German and Russian farm constructions. It was actually used as a royal residence. On the second floor, King Frederik William III would give tea parties, sometimes gathering up to 40 persons. Interior furnishings of the royal rooms affected extreme simplicity. Only a samovar from Tula and table and tea services produced by the Berlin royal porcelain manufactory specified the high position of the dweller. A porcelain service, gift of the Russian emperor Nicholas I, was decorated with painted gold on a malachite background, and scenes of rural life. Since Frederik William's time there has been a tiny monument to Tsar Alexander I, one meter in height.

The Waschhaus (English: wash house) is the largest nightclub of the Brandenburg state capital Potsdam in Germany. Founded in the summer of 1992 in the laundry rooms of the former garrison in the Schiffbauergasse, forty young people interested in art and culture started to present parties, events and exhibitions. Soon afterwards the Waschhaus e.V. club was founded. Now the Waschhaus Potsdam, it has established itself as a centre of art and culture with the main focus on music, film, dance and fine arts, has become a major attraction for the Potsdam cultural scene. Thousands of visitors attend the Schiffbauergasse every week to listen to concerts, see exhibitions, enjoy themselves at parties, watch movies or participate in dance workshops. Popular bands to have played here include Bloodhound Gang, Freundeskreis, Blumfeld, 17 Hippies and Wir sind Helden. Other highlights are the monthly exhibitions of nationally and internationally successful artists and the very popular open air cinema in the summer. In 2002, over 150,000 people visited the Waschhaus.