Cherry blossoms where the Berlin Wall once stood

The buds are appearing and will soon explode into a shower of pink petals.

The TV-Asahi cherry blossom avenue on the popular Berlin Wall trail in Teltow is beginning to bud.

The best time to see the cherry blossoms is from mid-March and mid-April.

Donation from Japan: A thousand trees in Teltow

The trail was built on the border strip directly after the fall of the Wall, with financial support from a Japanese television station. The Asahi channel launched a fundraising campaign to send this positive message after the reunification of Germany.

More than 1,000 Japanese ornamental cherries were planted between 1990 and 2010 and still bloom once a year.

For the past 20 years people have been flocking to the area to enjoy the blossoms and take selfies.

Artist Christian Badel from Berlin is among them. “It’s nothing short of a miracle,” he says: “Where a wall once separated East and West Berlin, flowering cherry trees now line the path, scattering their petals across the street”.

Gardens of the World

A hanami (literally “flower viewing”) is also held in the Gärten der Welt (Gardens of the World). This park in the district of Marzahn contains a group of themed gardens.

Opened in 1987 in what was East Berlin to commemorate the 750th anniversary of the city, the Gardens of the World was orignally called Berliner Gartenschau (Berlin Garden Show). The name was changed to Erholungspark Marzahn before it was given its present name in 2017.

The park contains separate Chinese, Oriental, Italian, Balinese, Korean and Japanese gardens.

On April 15 and 16 March 2024, the 63 blossoming cherry trees in the garden will be celebrated with traditional dancing, music and workshops.