Potsdam

Understand

For most of its recent history Potsdam has not been accessible from Berlin. The last station before the former GDR was Wannsee. Many of the buildings that are visible today have been reconstructed after the bombings of the Second World War and after the lax care of the East German Government. The city as we see it today is the work of five architects After the Great Elector said: "Das ganze Eyland muß ein Paradies werden" (The whole island must become a paradise): Peter Joseph Lenné, Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff, Carl Phillipp Christian von Gontard, Karl Friedrich Schinkel and Friedrich Ludwig Persius, and of course King Frederick the Great and Emperor Wilhelm II.

It is important to realize that most of the tourist attractions in the city are UNESCO World Heritage sites - these are:

Sanssouci Park and the Crown estate of Bornstedt

The New Garden including the Pfingstberg and the Russian colony of Alxandrowka

Babelsberg Park

Sacrow Park