Der Schirmmacher

There are things that are so anachronistic it’s almost unbelievable. For instance, there is still an old-fashioned umbrella specialty shop in Berlin. The small shop in Steglitz bears the evocative name “Der Schirmmacher Rolf Lippke” (The Umbrella Maker Rolf Lippke). The business fills a niche, because where, for heaven’s sake, can you still get a good umbrella repaired in Berlin? Well, at Rolf Lippke’s! He is one of the last trained umbrella makers in East Germany. Lippke repairs umbrellas and also produces new ones himself, from elegant women’s umbrellas to serious men’s umbrellas and even umbrellas to match a wedding dress.

The small shop actually carries only one single item: umbrellas. How the little shop manages to survive is puzzling, considering you can buy umbrellas for about 3 Euros in almost all drugstores. The only possible answer: the passion for beautiful umbrellas is still alive here. And anyone who inherited a noble umbrella with a mahogany handle from their grandfather now knows where to get it re-covered: at the umbrella maker in Berlin-Steglitz.