Ick bin Berliner

By the Red City Hall between Nikolaiviertel and Alexanderplatz

Ick bin Berliner lies at Rathausstrasse 19 in Mitte, in the stretch between Juedenstrasse and the Rathausbruecke and therefore right beside the Red City Hall. That building went up between 1861 and 1869 in the neo-Renaissance style, is still the seat of the governing mayor and carries on its facade the thirty-six-part terracotta frieze that the city calls the stone chronicle. Immediately behind it the Nikolaiviertel begins with its narrow lanes, on the other side lie the Marx-Engels-Forum and the Spree, and the television tower stands over all of it anyway. The further stretch of the street towards Gontardstrasse is a pedestrian zone, so the walk from Alexanderplatz is an easy one. The shop is run by Berliner Manufakturen Business Services with Michael Ruf and Josef Korkor at its head, who bring several Berlin workshops under one roof. For a shop that collects Berlin products the neighbourhood could hardly fit better.

Over six hundred products from Berlin workshops

Nothing at all is produced at Ick bin Berliner itself, and that is the principle: the shop sees itself as a curator and gathers what is made elsewhere in the city. Over six hundred articles stand on the shelves, sorted into snacks, sweets, breakfast and drinks with and without alcohol. Names such as Berliner Brandstifter, Spree Gin, Mampe, Schilkin, the Lemke brewery, the Berliner Kaffeeroesterei and the confectioner Sawade are represented. One rule the team takes seriously: a product enters the range only once somebody has visited the workshop behind it. The whole assortment is certified organic, and a few articles carry the houses own name, among them a currywurst in a jar for 6.95 euros. A box of pralines shaped like the television tower costs 19.95 euros. Beside the shop stands a second business that is barely visible from outside, because hotels, companies and event organisers have their own editions, minibar ranges and gifts assembled here.