Club Life Threatened in Berlin
With rising rent prices and a visible shift of city priorities, from embracing its artistic underground to chasing after the corporate euro, the existence of the nightclubs of Berlin continues to be threatened, according to Reuters.
While thousands of tourists flock to Berlin every weekend to experience its legendary nightlife, which can often stretch until Monday morning, it seems many of the city’s best venues are being forced to close. For example, the area of Prenzlauer Berg, which was once a nightlife hotspot, has been subject to intense gentrification in recent years and is now known as a base for young families.
It is estimated that music earms the city up to one billion euros per year, and with Berlin’s reputation as a mecca for all things techno - it’s not hard to see why.
Even SO36 in the Kreuzberg district, a punk and indie club which was frequented by Iggy Pop and David Bowie in the 1970s, was threatened with closure in 2009, simply because of a single noise complaint.
The Berlin Club Commission continues to support and defend the needs of the city’s club owners, and a one million euro fund to this aim has been created by the city itself.