Cinemas are back on the cultural map this summer, with lockdown easing and big releases on the slate. A fair few of them have used the time while shuttered to lick of paint, Berlin’s historic Blauer Stern – ‘Blue Star’ – has gone a step further and reinvented itself as the cinema that most looks like a sexy ‘70s nightclub. And we are so incredibly here for it.
When Germany’s cinemas reopen, the lucky people of Berlin’s Pankow district will discover their neighbourhood kino freshly transformed in electric blue and ‘cinema red’.
This sexy makeover, overseen by Berlin’s Batek Architekten, is inspired by local painter Mechtild van Ahlers. The walls are printed fabric and the foyer has LED lighting inspired by the original plasterwork in the foyer. It’s like being in a movie while you watch one.
We love our local fleapit with a passion but this one is a David Lynchian dream of a picture palace and all things being equal, we’d probably swap.
The Blauer Stern, which is now run by exhibitors Yorck Kinogruppe, dates back to 1870 as an Art Nouveau building and 1933 as a cinema. It closed around the time the Berlin Wall fell but sprang back to life in the mid-’90s. Next time you’re in Berlin, give it a spin.
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