Mall of Berlin

Where in the year 1897 the legendary and sophisticated Wertheim Department Store, with over 100,000 square feet of retail space between Leipziger Platz and Wilhelmstraße, was the big hit, now loads the state-of-the-art “Mall of Berlin” with a sales area of about 80,000 square meters to go shopping. 

Designers like Karl Lagerfeld, Armani, Miranda Konstantinidou, Marc Cain, and Hugo Boss are to be found here, but also C&A, H&M, Zara, and Mango, as well as McPaper and Aldi, are presented in the mall. The second floor, which caters to the latest teen trends, is likely to be the kids’ first choice. There are also over 30 restaurants in the mall. The Mall of Berlin, a 270-store complex located in the city center, gives the growing number of tourists who visit the German capital a new place to spend their money. Within a year, it’s set to become the country’s largest shopping center as 30 percent more space is added.

The Mall of Berlin, located on the site of the former Wertheim department store, is just a 5-minute walk from Potsdamer Platz.

Getting Here: BY BUS Bus: M48, 200—Station: U Mohrenstraße or Leipziger Str./Wilhelmstr. Night bus N2 (station: Potsdamer Platz). By S-Bahn and subway U-Bahn: U2 (entrance located directly in front of the Mohrenstraße station). Bus: M48, 200—Station: U Mohrenstraße or Leipziger Str./Wilhelmstr. The Mall of Berlin is located on the site of the former Wertheim department store, just a 5-minute walk from Potsdamer Platz. 

With 100,000 square meters (1 million square feet) of shops in low-rise stone and glass townhouses, the mall evokes the area’s prewar architecture. The new shopping center is made up of stone-clad, low-rise buildings that echo the original Wertheim’s architecture, with decorative arches around the courtyard and floral carvings on the benches. The complex features large photographs of the Wertheim, which the Nazis seized from a Jewish family with the same name in 1937. The arcade in the middle, with an arched roof but open on both ends, helps integrate the mall into the city, giving life to what has been a dead zone since the Berlin Wall came down. The center helped revive Leipziger Platz and Wilhelmstrasse, which have little in the way of street life, with restaurants and stores facing out of the mall and onto surrounding sidewalks.

On the ground floor and the first floor, you will find a wide range of fashion items, from everyday jeans to elegant designer creations. The second floor is all dedicated to shoes, the large food court, and the kids’ world. The basement floor is home to various stores for food and sporting goods. The highlight of the Mall of Berlin, however, is its elegant and airy piazza. On four storeys, visitors can stroll through this bright temple of goods along a beautifully lit passage under a curved glass roof connecting the two buildings of the mall between the Bundesrat (Leipziger Straße) and the Holocaust Memorial (Voßstraße). On the passages to each floor, you can cast your eye over the view—over the visitors taking a break with a latte macchiato in the cafe in the arcade, and of course over the countless shops.