uberlin

We were surprised to learn that there’s a dearth of good, exotic tea here in Berlin. We’ve always been impressed by the array on offer, varied in colour, origin and purported healing properties; it seemed to us that you can get everything except the bog-standard black stuff that we Brits think of as tea. But that’s before we were given an education by Jens de Gruyter of Charlottenburg boutique Paper & Tea. Inspired by his Asian travels, the French Canadian is on a mission to bring fine and rare teas to the German capital, and to break down the barriers around the beverage.

The P&T store is a dramatic step beyond the traditional apothecary model, as teas are no longer hidden behind a counter but presented in an open and informative setting. Tea fanatics can browse the beautiful boutique at their leisure, choose to consult one of the many friendly experts, or indulge in a demonstration at one of the tasting stations inspired by the traditional Chinese GongFu ceremony.

De Gruyer introduced us to a China White (Pu Er Bai Ya) picked from 2-300 year old trees, which lend it a resiny “salad” taste, and a Taiwan Oolong (Oriental Beauty) which is something of a national treasure – produced by the first of their farmers to go organic and oxidised on the leaf by the bites of an insect called the green leafhopper. As well as a new-found appreciation for the beverage, we learned some interesting facts: did you know that the water used to steep tea need not always be boiling, and can be as cool as 50°C for some Japanese varieties?

Before Jens sends you away with your new favourite tea in a plain packet (“you’re buying the tea, not the packaging”), be sure to browse the pottery and paraphernalia produced by Asian artisans, and a stationery section to rival RSVP in Mitte. You don’t need to accept that both paper and tea are “agents of culture” to appreciate cards, calendars and other items made by Korean manufacturers and Berlin artists, some commissioned by P&T themselves.

While we’ll remain those rare Englishmen that prefer coffee to tea, we think that Paper & Tea does for its commodity what Frau Tonis Perfume do for theirs: elevating appreciation of the product and its production, and creating an enjoyable, enlightening shopping experience. Take your mum.

Berlin, you temptress you. Here I was, counting my pennies like a good girl, and you’ve only gone and opened up a concept store that makes me want to sell everything I own and clean them out Victoria Beckham stylee. Andreas Murkudis sits in the former Tagesspiegel building in northern Schöneberg and this light, airy space is more reminiscent of an art gallery than your average designer store.

With collections, all handpicked by Murkudis himself, from the likes of Céline, Dries van Noten and Maison Martin Margiela – and some right bobby dazzler (Geordie for beautiful) homewares – I ooh-ed and ahh-ed my way around the store. I became mesmerized by one of the Bi-Cabas Céline totes (pictured below) that has been on my “if I ever win the lottery” list… very, VERY tempting. One more visit to this she-devil of a store and I might just be swayed!

Our recent trip to Stockholm was a feast for the eyes, but it wasn’t just the scenery that was stunning, but also the flagship store of my current brand crush, Acne. For me, the fashion house embodies the Stockholm aesthetic of effortlessly cool minimalism, so it would have been a crime not to visit them in their hometown. The staff were super nice, super hot (damn you Swedes!) and even allowed me to take some photos to remember them by. In between my drooling and staring (at the collection, of course), I bagged myself two pairs of jeans and the most perfect leather jacket. Even better, because their prices are so much cheaper  in Sweden than in Germany or the UK, I was saving money! … At least that’s what I tell myself. Looking at their Spring Summer 2012 collection I think another trip to Stockholm might be in order as well, hooray!

Click here to read all about our trip to Copenhagen and Stockholm.

Move over RSVP, we’ve found a new favourite paper porn palace! Modular at Moritzplatz more than lives up to its tagline, “material total”, by offering stationary, art supplies and even furniture in all shapes, sizes and colours of the spectrum. The building also houses design studios, picture framers and a couple of cafés, making Modular more of a creative lifestyle brand than just a supply store.

Its concern with both form and function, and blurring of the lines between home and work, reflects what we feel is a very Berlin mindset. In a city where many homes are converted factories and many places of work are in old apartment buildings, why shouldn’t your office be as aesthetically pleasing as your home, and your flat as functional as your office?

Theorising aside, do check out Modular – chances are you’ll find us wandering aimlessly through its aisles, saying irrational things like ”Ooo… I love these! What are they? Can we get one in every colour of the rainbow?” If you experience the same kind of “supply snow blindness”, we recommend using the 3D relief map of Berlin, pictured in the last photo, to reorientate yourself. Yes, that’s where you are…

Serendipity. Today is Record Store Day in Berlin, and a little over a week ago some visiting friends from the UK helped us uncover the city’s best record store: Bis Auf’s Messer. Kevin Cousins waxes (sorry!) lyrical about Friedrichshain’s home of hardcore.

“Bis Auf’s Messer” stands for, roughly translated, “fight to the bloody end”, a reference to the owners’ tenacity in the face of opposition to their starting yet another record shop in the city. This alone places the store at top of my list for “Most Metal Shop Names”, however, a brief visit to Bis Auf’s Messer pushes this excellent centre for all things “alternative” towards the top of my list of favourite record stores: period.

Bis Auf’s Messer primarily stocks vinyl, lovely, meaty great stacks of it, divided into suitably obscure categories including “noise”, “garage rock”, “grind”, and, most abundantly, “hardcore”. Indeed, this is a business very much true to the tenets and values of punk rock: placing releases by established acts alongside records by miniscule bands on no-name labels with photocopied artwork. My girlfriend Liz loves music of this elusive genre, and she was impressed to find so many hardcore releases in one place, with many discs that are absent from our normal London haunts.

Liz and Kev's buys courtesy of Liz Wood

Great finds during my visit included a !!! record at half price, a huge selection of Dischord releases (I bought the Faraquet album, which I’ve never seen outside the label’s website before), a Minutemen t-shirt, a Husker Du outtakes collection, and a small but great selection of jazz reissues. As if that wasn’t enough to induce a nerd meltdown, two versions of Mastodon’s Blood Mountain – on single “custom-coloured” and double deluxe, because I know you care – had my glasses steaming up. Liz bought a copy of snotty, legendary, and increasingly scarce hardcore magazine, Maximum Rock n’Roll, worth reading for its hilarious letters pages where disgruntled punkers vent their rage against “The Man”, Simon Cowell and pretty much every other aspect of their maligned existence, including each other.

What also pleases is that a clear sense of community and warmth is apparent: the shop supports local musicians and stocks a wide range of fanzines, while the owner we met was friendly, enthusiastic and approachable. He was happy to chat to Liz and answer questions, make recommendations, and so on. You don’t get this in HMV. Overall, a great treat for the vinyl aficionado and casual browser alike. Check out the excellent webstore, too.

Bis Auf’s Messer
Marchlewski Strasse 107
10243 Berlin
bisaufsmesser.com

Liz and Kev's buys courtesy of Liz Wood

Oh SNAP Foodie in Berlin! You just beat us to a post about Kadó Lakritzfachgeschäft on Graefestrasse. But what we lack in timeliness, we can more than make up for enthusiasm, because I am *mad* for liquorice! And it turns out our Kiez is a veritable Lakritz lover’s paradise, what with the ice cream shop next door selling Eis flavoured with the black stuff, and with Kadó just around the corner. We too were surprised a) to find a shop dedicated to products with a decidedly acquired taste, and b) to find it packed. But whether you like liquorice or not, you’ll enjoy this charming little store, its endless variations on a surprisingly adaptable ingredient (sweet, salty, spicy; in and around chocolate; as a spirit, etc.) and the infectious enthusiasm of its knowledgeable staff. Check out Foodie’s take, then the store itself – just bring me a bag back of something pitch-black.

We recently asked our Facebook fans what they wanted to see more of on the blog and the top answer so far (go vote!) has been “cool things to see and do in Berlin”. Now we don’t get out much, and if we do, we don’t stray from our Kiez – but that’s OK, because the area around Graefestrasse in Kreuzberg has everything we need (except for great coffee).

I decided that a niftybobs way of introducing you to the neighbourhood would be a personalised Google Map marked up with our highlights. As well as a dangerous number of eateries (I’m writing this with a gut-full of ice cream), there are bars, Hard Wax records (which I’m claiming even though its located over the canal), an expert tattooists and – what the what? – a licorice shop??!!

So have a click around Graefekiez. Let us know if we’ve missed anything, and why not make a map of your area? We’d love to get an insider’s view on other parts of Berlin. Ciao!

View Graefekiez in a larger map

I admit that when James and I were weighing up the move from London to Berlin, the fact that we would be leaving one of the greatest shopping destinations in the world made me wobble a bit. Of course I would miss my family and friends but they could always visit me – Selfridges could not. Thankfully though, after living here a month, my concerns about Berlin shopping not being able to compare to London are fading fast. It may not have the sheer quantity and range London has, but it more than makes up for its smaller size by having some great independent boutiques, an emphasis on individuality rather than the UK’s throw-away fashion ideal and generally providing a much nicer shopping experience (I still have nightmares about Oxford Circus at Christmas time!).

A new discovery, which oozes this Berlin mentality, is the vintage store Colours. Selling clothes by the kilo, this warehouse does require much rifling through the rails, but your perseverance will pay off with a gem or two I promise.

We may not always agree on shopping destinations (COS again Zoë?), but the one place that gets both of our consumerist juices flowing is paper porn paradise R.S.V.P. This small, wood-lined shop in Mitte is like the stationary cupboard of our nerdiest fantasies, stacked high with beautifully designed notebooks, pens and accessories from around the world. R.S.V.P recalls a time before paperless offices and the digitisation of everything, when the written word really mattered, and while there is an online shop, it’s little substitute for actually being there – feeling the oversized desk calendars heavy in your hands, or enjoying the satisfying click of a Japanese fountain pen. Ooh, I just felt a little shiver.