Potsdam is the capital of Brandenburg state in Germany, a city of 185,000 on the Havel River 26 km southwest of central Berlin — the city of Prussian kings and German emperors, where the most important conference of the post-war world order (the Potsdam Conference, July–August 1945, Stalin, Truman and Churchill/Attlee) divided Germany and shaped the Cold War, and one of the most extraordinary concentrations of royal palaces and park landscapes in Europe. The UNESCO World Heritage-listed palaces and parks of Potsdam (inscribed 1990) cover 500 ha of interlinked palace grounds containing 30 palaces, 150 buildings and 700 ha of landscape parks — the ensemble was created by the Hohenzollern dynasty over 500 years from the 17th to 20th century and represents the most complete expression of Prussian royal taste in architecture and garden design. Sanssouci ("Without Worry" in French, the language of the Prussian court) was Frederick the Great's personal summer palace (1747), a single-storey rococo building on 6 terraced vine-covered hillside with 300 rooms of extraordinary interiors — the palace where Frederick lived for 40 of his 46 years on the throne, composed his flute concertos, exchanged letters with Voltaire (who stayed here 3 years, 1750–1753) and received Kant. The Potsdam Conference (July 17–August 2, 1945) took place in the Cecilienhof Palace (the last royal palace built by the Hohenzollerns, 1917) where the Big Three decided the post-war borders of Germany and Europe, arranged the demilitarization and denazification of Germany, established the Oder-Neisse border between Germany and Poland, and agreed on the terms of the Nuremberg Trials — decisions that shaped the 20th century. Potsdam is a 30-minute S-Bahn ride from Berlin and can be visited as a day trip, but deserves two days to do the palaces justice.
Sanssouci (1745-1747, Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff) is Frederick the Great's personal masterpiece — the single-storey yellow rococo palace on 6 terraced vine-covered hillsides has 12 rooms of extraordinary interiors including the oval library (where Frederick composed music and read the French Enlightenment philosophers) and the Voltaire Room (decorated with flowers and fruits for the philosopher's 3-year stay); book tickets in advance online — capacity strictly limited.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Sanssouci Park (700 ha, UNESCO) is one of the finest 18th-century landscape parks in Europe — the Chinese Tea House (a gilded Chinoiserie pavilion with golden palm trees and mandarins, 1757), the Neue Kammern (New Chambers, the royal guest suite), the Ruinenberg (artificial Roman ruins on a hill), the Orangery Palace and the Dragon House (vineyard keeper's cottage in Chinese style) are scattered through the park.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideFrederick the Great specified in his will that he wished to be buried beside his greyhounds on the terraced hillside at Sanssouci, without ceremony and with the simplicity of a soldier — for 205 years this wish was not respected and he was buried elsewhere; in 1991, after German reunification, his remains were returned and he now lies under the 6th terrace in an unmarked stone slab, exactly as he requested, with 6 potatoes left by visitors (Prussian symbol of his agricultural reforms that saved Germany from famine).
Cecilienhof Palace (1917, the last Hohenzollern palace) was the setting of the Potsdam Conference (July 17–August 2, 1945) — the round table where Stalin, Truman and Churchill (replaced mid-conference by Attlee) decided the post-war world order is preserved exactly as it was; the giant red star of flowers planted by Soviet soldiers for the conference in the courtyard is replanted every year.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Dutch Quarter (Holländisches Viertel, 1733-1742, 134 Dutch-style brick gabled buildings built to attract Dutch craftsmen to Prussia) has excellent restaurants and cafes in the converted historic houses — Brandenburgisches Wirtshaus serves Märkische Küche (Brandenburg regional cooking: slow-cooked pork, lentil soup, pickled cucumber) and the Schmerberger regional craft beer.
The Neues Palais (New Palace, 1763-1769, the largest building in Sanssouci Park) was built by Frederick the Great after the Seven Years' War as a demonstration of Prussian power and wealth — 322 rooms, the Grotto Hall (a room covered entirely in shells, crystals and stones), the marble-columned Marble Gallery and the Theatre; the building was Kaiser Wilhelm II's preferred summer residence until 1918 abdication.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Alexandrowka (1826, UNESCO World Heritage) is a Russian village built by King Friedrich Wilhelm III for Russian singers brought to Berlin as prisoners after the wars against Napoleon — 13 log cabin houses with carved wooden decorations, a Russian Orthodox chapel and a small museum in the only original house; the colony was built as an exotic curiosity and is now the most authentic Russian village architecture outside Russia.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Glienicke Bridge (the "Bridge of Spies", marking the border between West Berlin and East German Potsdam during the Cold War) was the location of the three major Soviet-American spy exchanges: Rudolf Abel for U-2 pilot Gary Powers (1962, the basis for the Spielberg film), Freddie Pryor (1962) and Anatoli Shcharansky for Soviet spies (1986); the bridge is walkable and the meeting point in the middle is marked.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBabelsberg Park (across the Havel from Potsdam, 1833, Peter Joseph Lenné and Prince Pückler-Muskau) is the English landscape park of Crown Prince Wilhelm — the neo-Gothic Flatow Tower, the Kleines Schloss (small palace) and the views over the Havel lakes and the Glienicke Bridge at sunset are the finest in the Potsdam area; in 1912 the park contained the world's first film studio (Babelsberg Studio).
Potsdam has its own Brandenburg Gate (1771, by Karl von Gontard, built 8 years before the Berlin one) at the end of the Brandenburger Strasse pedestrian zone — it is a Roman triumphal arch style rather than Berlin's Greek Doric; the Brandenburger Strasse itself (the finest Baroque street in Potsdam) leads to the Church of St Nicholas (1849, Schinkel, the dominant dome over the city).
Babelsberg Film Studio (founded 1912, the oldest large-scale film studio in the world) has produced Metropolis (Fritz Lang, 1927), The Blue Angel, the Muppet films and recent blockbusters (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Inglourious Basterds); the Film Park tour includes the sets, the stunt show and the exhibition on German film history; the studio is still operating — visitors sometimes see active productions.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Orangery Palace (1851-1860, Friedrich August Stüler, modelled on Villa Medici in Rome) is the most Italian-looking building in Potsdam — the 300 m long Renaissance-style palace was built by Friedrich Wilhelm IV who had never visited Italy but was obsessed with the Italian Renaissance; the interior has the famous 'Raphael Room' with 47 19th-century copies of Raphael's paintings.
The Sanssouci terraces (the 6 vine-covered terraces below the palace) still produce Riesling, Weißburgunder and Spätburgunder grapes tended by palace gardeners — the terrace wines are sold at the palace shop and poured at the Drachenhaus restaurant (the vineyard keeper's Chinese pavilion, now a café) at sunset over the park; a glass of Sanssouci Riesling looking up at Frederick's tomb is the definitive Potsdam farewell.