In 1668, the Dutchman Langelaer laid out an avenue starting from the west side of the City Palace running parallel to its ground plan, which originally ran all the way to Golm. Starting in 1671, this avenue was built out to the Neustädter Tor - New City Gate as "The Elector's Privilege".
Only in 1721 was the section leading to the Neustädter Havelbucht (New City Havel River Bay) added. Frederick II had imposing, representative houses constructed along this avenue, which had already been named Breite Straße - Broad Street - by that time. Some façades of these houses were actually sketched by the King himself. Parts of Breite Straße were destroyed in 1945. Finally, in 1972-73, the street was lengthened to link up with the Zeppelinstraße, by means of filling-in sections of the Neustädter Havelbucht.
Film Museum
"But what do I see here? Right against the palace are the royal stables, / Worthy to be looked upon, / In that it is not the architecture alone to be enjoyed, ...."
Bellamintes' report dates back to a time when Frederick William I had converted an orangery into stables.
In 1685, Elector Frederick William had an orangery built next to the City Palace, the so-called Pomeranzenhaus (house for bitter oranges), as the winter quarters for his plants from southern lands. In 1714, when a section of the pleasure ground was transformed into a drill field, the orangery was also affected. Bellamintes had once sung the praises of "horses so adroit" sheltered here, that it was "as if they would have wings at their feet".
Frederick II left it as a royal stable, but had it rebuilt in 1746 and lengthened by one third. Up until 1922, the building was used as a stable. A garrison museum and exhibitions of the Potsdam arts association were later housed here. Heavily damaged during WWII, the makeshift repairs allowed the former royal stables to become the home and exhibit rooms for the town museum. In 1977, extensive restoration work started, which skilled Polish construction workers carried out. The Royal Stable then became the Film Museum, which it remains today.
Entrance to Breite Straße
Schlossstraße, nos. 13 and 14
Frederick II made it his business to replace the standard baroque buildings of his father with more impressive structures, and thus, lend Potsdam more brilliance. In the works of Friedrich Nikolai we can read in the "Description of the Royal Residence Cities Berlin and Potsdam..." (1786), that the houses at the entrance to Breite Straße street are supposed to have been the first buildings Frederick had built in Potsdam following his accession to the throne. The houses indicated lie in Schlossstraße Nr. 13 - the current youth club - and Nr. 14 - the current casino. Both houses were built in the year 1748 upon older foundations. Von Knobelsdorff had designed them as elegant residential buildings to border the west edge of the pleasure ground.
In 1895 the owner of house Nr. 13 was the court physician Dr. Stolte, and in 1938 it housed a general agency of the Allianz insurance company. For the first half of the 20th century, the restaurant "Zum Lustgarten" - On the Pleasure Ground - was resident in Schlossstraße Nr. 14.
Long Stables
"The large riding house will deserve a place here," Bellamintes tells us, and is referring to a building next to the Garrison Church, of which only the façade remains today.
In order to enable the drills to be held even in bad weather, Frederick William I had a framework building constructed between the current Yorckstrasse and Breitestraße with a length of 120 meters (other sources say even 150 meters) and a width of 18 meters, which served as a drill ground for his and his successors' soldiers. In 1781, Frederick II had his architect Unger build a special façade for the drill house: 22.5 meters high, 23 meters wide, and 4 meters thick. While the actual Long Stable was destroyed in 1945, the false façade was retained and finally restored in 1983-84.
Garnisonkirche - Garrison Church
(archway on Breite Straße)
By the year 2017, the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, the Potsdam Court, and Garrison Church is to be re-constructed on this spot. It fell victim to bombs in 1945; the ruins were removed in 1968.
On January 1, 1722, the first Court and Garrison Church was consecrated in Potsdam. It was a half-timbered building and had only a small roof turret. Nonetheless Bellamintes composed: "Here waves to me the tower from this church building, / Where the inhabitants seat themselves at the feet of God, / And where even the King himself from the beloved meadow / And the pleasant power of words takes delight."
Built on marshy ground, the church began to sink in 1730 and was demolished. The architect Philipp Gerlach (1679-1748), who already had the predecessor building and the town church St. Nikolai constructed, received the order for a massive new structure. The construction began in 1731, one year later the church was ready, and by 1735, so was the tower. A 35-bell carillon from the Netherlands, which had already hung in the old church building, was re-hung - now with the addition of five more bells. Since 1797, every hour on the hour, "Praise the Lord" rang out, and at the bottom of the hour, the famous Mozart melody "Üb' immer Treu und Redlichkeit ...."
In 1740, Frederick William I was buried in the crypt of the church, and in 1786, Frederick II was buried there - against his own declared wish. Czar Alexander (1805) and Napoleon I (1806) both paid visits to the burial crypt.
On the March 21, 1933, the so-called "Potsdam Day," the alliance between German fascism and the Prussian military was celebrated in the church by Reich's Chancellor Adolf Hitler and Reich President von Hindenburg.
During the government of Frederick William I, three large, new churches were built in Potsdam: the town church St. Nikolai (1721-1724 and anew in the 19th century), the Church of the Holy Ghost (1726-1728, destroyed 1945), and the Garrison Church (1730-1735). All three churches once stood in an almost straight line from west to east, and with their practically 90 meters high steeples they towered over the not-quite-so-big town, forming a unique urban ensemble.
Great Military Orphanage
The first military orphanage was built in Potsdam between 1722 and 1724 following the example of the Franckesche Stiftung (Franke Foundation) in Halle, which Frederick William I had visited in 1713 and 1720. It was built to accommodate, care for, and educate the children of soldiers who had fallen, were otherwise deceased, or impoverished. Initially only for boys, the orphanage accepted girls in 1725, with 600 children in all.
Bellamintes wrote these verses about the first three-wing structure of half-timberwork and stones: "Such a house equals the largest and most splendid palaces, and surpasses many when it comes to spaciousness and order."
The king assigned various royal properties to the house to supply it with food. Moreover, the orphanage also acted as an economic enterprise "at royal expense." In 1725, it operated as one of the largest state textile and linen manufactures, such as the Berlin Warehouse and an aluminum mine in Freienwalde. In addition, the pupils were hired for work outside the house, such as, in the weapons factory, where 50 lads were working up to 10 hours per day, and at textile manufactures. In 1740, the house had 1400 male and 155 female pupils.
In the years between 1771 and 1777 the Great Military Orphanage was completely renovated by order of Frederick II. Following plans drafted by Gontard, an enclosed four-wing building was now erected on the old foundations. The work began at Breite Straße. On Lindenstraße arose a masterly stairwell and the Monopteros tower with the statue of Charity.
The following period was partly subject to strict orientation along military organizational principles. The orphanage was only placed under civil administration in 1919/20 as a result of the Versailles Treaty. In 1933-34, it was renamed Nationalpolitische Erziehungsanstalt (National Political School). In 1937, it was placed under the Wehrmacht administration, and parts of the house were destroyed, including the Monopteros tower, in 1945.
After 1945, the complex served as a children's home, then later as an office building and boarding school for the Teachers' College. In 2004, after 20 years of extensive reconstruction efforts, the Monopteros could be rebuilt and a statue of Charity - the Caritas - was put in place once again.
One of the pupils of the military orphanage at the beginning of the 19th century was Eleonore Prochaska.
Hiller-Brandtsche Houses
Breite Straße, Nr. 26/27
The Hiller-Brandtschen houses are some of the individual townhouses with palace-style façades, which Frederick II had built at his own expense. They were named after their tenants: the merchant Johann Friedrich Hiller and the master tailor Johann Gebhardt Brandt.
Unger designed the façade, closely following the plans for Whitehall Palace in London, which were drawn up by the renowned English architect Inigo Jones (1573-1652). Jones himself had borrowed from the Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio. It is significant that these houses were built directly opposite the orphanage and were in harmony with it.
The owners always lived in each of the respective four-storied parts of the house, and the three-storied section in the center was used to accommodate soldiers.
That house must have impressed both Frederick II, the building's owner, as well as the citizens of Potsdam, so much, that Unger was able to build another 300 townhouses, as well as a great number of public buildings in Potsdam. Ironically, Jones' plans for Whitehall Palace were never implemented.
Ständehaus - House of the Provincial Estates
Breite Straße, Nr. 13
Unger built the house in 1770 for the Provincial Estates from the Zauche region in Brandenburg. It is one of the most architecturally valuable buildings in the city center, since its calm pilaster structure already points to the later classical architecture style. The residence of the district tax collector and conference rooms for the district administrators were located in the house. Statues representing "Wealth" (Ceres) and "Justice" (Justitia) were placed above the central axis of the building.
Due to the Provincial Estates relocating elsewhere, the structure was used as a residential building from 1815. Since 1960, after war-damage and subsequent restoration it has served as a museum. Today, the House of the Provincial Estates is the home of the Potsdam Natural History Museum with a permanent exhibit of Brandenburg's fauna, an aquarium for viewing the fish native to Brandenburg as well as special exhibits.
It is the first house in the Breite Straße boasting a front garden designed faithfully after a historic example.
Obelisk
The first Neustädter Tor - New City Gate - was built in 1722 and sealed the First Town Extension to the west. A second gate was erected by the architect von Knobelsdorff in 1753. It lay along the visual axis from the city palace and was designed in a correspondingly representative fashion. Two obelisks marked the end of the street. Only one of them remained after 1945, and in 1981, it was relocated close to its original location. The hieroglyphs depicted were chosen according to their artistically visual merits; their meaning had not yet been deciphered at the time.
"The Mosque"
The steam engine house along the New City Havel Bay strikes the observer as exotic. Frederick William IV had Ludwig Persius construct it in 1841-43 "according to the style of Turkish mosques with a minaret as chimney." The pump served to supply the water fountains in Sanssouci park.
The most powerful steam engine built in Prussia up to that time, the brainchild of the young entrepreneur, August Borsig, boasted 81.4 PS (80.2 hp). When it was put into operation for the first time in October 1842, it raised the jet of the water in the great fountain in front of Sanssouci Palace to a height of 38 meters. Today it is a technical monument, although totally functional.
Kiezstraße
This was the site of a settlement of mainly Slav fishermen at the beginning of the 13th century. In 1349, "Kytz zu Postamp" was mentioned in a document. The territory was only included within the town limits of Potsdam as of 1721. Kiezstraße received its contemporary look from the Rococo structures built after 1777. In 1844-45 the architect Persius designed and built a hall for the freemasons' lodge, "Minerva", in Kiezstraße, Nr. 10.
New Pleasure Ground
The Pleasure Ground, which belonged to the City Palace, was once located south-west of the palace between Breite Straße and the Havel river. It was the oldest garden in town, and was often given a new look by garden architects, among them, Lenné himself in 1818. One can find the Neptune Basin, the linear axes of the baroque pathways, and the tree-lined alleys and groves drawn on a plan from 1829.
After the destruction of World War II and the following redesign of the city center, a stadium and the current Hotel Mercure were constructed on this site. In conjunction with the National Horticulture Show 2001, an attempt to approximate the historic ground plan was made. Next to the large fairgrounds directly along the street, today's New Pleasure Ground also offers attractive green spaces, lime-tree groves, and a gallery of hops as a substitute for the Orangery which once stood at the southern edge of the Pleasure Ground. The Neptune Basin has been cleared. It was built in 1701 to harbor the royal pleasure ships and was detached from the Havel river only in 1750. It contains the remains of the Neptune sculptural group, which had once adorned the Basin.
The Karl Liebknecht Forum is also located in the Pleasure Ground, along with the sculpture "Heart and Flame of the Revolution" (1983, Theo Balden), which was relocated here from Breite Straße . The harbor for the White Fleet Potsdam was also re-designed for the BUGA 2001 (the National Horticulture Show).
Ringerkolonnade - the Wrestlers' Colonnade
When Frederick II had von Knobelsdorff renovate the Potsdam City Palace from 1745 to 1751, the space between the royal stables and the palace received a colonnade known as the "Wrestlers' Colonnade," named after the groups of figures which adorned it. The preserved remnants of this sculpture were placed near the harbor in 1970.
