I think I speak for everyone when I say that we had an incredible time on our study tour in Berlin. Whilst not a traditionally beautiful city in the way that others are, the complex history and cultural offerings secure it as an unmissable one.

We began with a walking tour to get our bearings and see some of the iconic sites, such as the Brandenburg Gate, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe by Peter Eisenman, bits and pieces of the Berlin wall and Museum Island. That evening, a large group of us went to see a stunning performance at the Berliner Philharmonie.

On Sunday, we broke off into smaller groups to explore various other architectural delights. We will be sharing our experiences with these in more detail over the next few posts, but these included a trip to the Bauhaus, the Bauhaus Archive, a co-housing tour, Museum for Architectural Drawing and Sammlung Boros – a contemporary art collection housed in a former bunker. We all re-joined for an excellent dinner that night (photo above) with loads of stories and photos to share from our various activities of the day.

Monday was our final day in Berlin. Many of us took a trip to the Neues Museum, refurbished by David Chipperfield, which genuinely took our breath away – an architectural tour de force. Another group did a co-housing tour specifically in the neighbourhood of Kreuzberg, some explored the housing in Hansaviertel between the Tiergarten park and the Spree river, and others ended their trip with an epic landscape bike ride through a variety of parks and a nearby forest.