Blumen-und Gartenkunst Tunger-Schnur

A shop on the old military road to Spandau

Blumen- und Gartenkunst stands at Alt-Moabit 21, on a street that follows the course of the old Spandau military road and has carried its present name since 1875; the first houses went up here between 1859 and 1861. The neighbourhood is unusually mixed: a few numbers along stands the oldest pharmacy in Moabit, around the corner lies the prison with the rear entrance to the criminal court, and in the other direction the Carl von Ossietzky park opens up along with the church of St John designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel. The shop is recognisable from far off, because plants, bouquets and art objects reach out across the pavement. Inside, the flowers are set out by colour, and the range is put together afresh each morning. The address is reached from Turmstrasse station on the U9 with the Alt-Moabit exit, from Bellevue station and by bus routes 187 and 245. At the eastern end of the street stands the federal interior ministry, and the two and a half kilometres in between show Moabit across its whole range, from the court quarter through residential blocks to the commercial yards towards Beusselstrasse.

Floristry and garden design under one roof

The house is led by Andreas Tunger, who is a floristry technician, and by Thomas Tunger-Schnur, who as a qualified engineer is responsible for the landscape planning; the two have run the business for almost thirty years and live on the street themselves. From that follows the double structure: on one side stand bouquets, arrangements, table and wedding flowers and funeral work, on the other a garden department of its own that plans and lays out private gardens, planted courtyards, roof gardens, terraces and graves. Among the reference courtyards is the pharmacy house on the same street. The plants come where possible from nurseries in Berlin and the surrounding area, the accessories from traditional workshops in Germany and Europe, from glassworks through papier mache manufacturers to joineries. Beside that runs a programme of botanical talks, seminars on growing roses and flowers, garden excursions and readings. The house has furnished state receptions at Meseberg Palace, the Neue Nationalgalerie, the Academy of Arts and several embassies. That Blumen- und Gartenkunst has nonetheless remained a neighbourhood shop, where the bouquet for the evening is tied as well, belongs to the pleasant contradictions of this address.