Well, hi there. My name is Sven, and I’m the editorin-chief of Lodown magazine, a publication I’m pretty sure you’ll like if only you’d just buy it. I’m one half of a creative office that goes by the name of Brand New History as well, where we like to keep a steroid pumped graphic world clean. These two boxes aren’t only connected by being located in the same neighbourhood in Berlin, but by providing a freethinking link between supply and demand too. Well, that’s how I see it at least.

The city I was born in --the city that formed, informed and fed me--ran through some drastic changes particularly during the last decades. Physical and mental barriers slowly came down, and my town was finally allowed to present its true colours to the world, regardless if you like them or not. Regardless of what I think of them. By now, Berlin feels like a remix album… one of the rare ones that actually doesn’t suck because the attitude and personality of the original material is still intact. Depending on my mood I sometimes even like the touched material better than the original.

I was born in West Berlin on June 26th. On the very same day, just a couple of years earlier, President John F. Kennedy visited my hometown during his famous European tour. He tried to build and establish unity among America’s allies and spoke many famous words to a cheering crowd in front of West Berlin’s city hall.

“Ich bin ein Berliner,” words of solidarity from Captain America directed to a nation that was still heavily scarred from the delusion of grandeur of its former leaders. Like any other kid in Germany, I’d learned the meaning of this phrase in elementary school. It just took me a lot longer to find out what it actually meant to me.

I grew up in the American Sector. From my window I could see the Berlin Wall, it wasn’t on the other side of the street though, the view from the 14th floor just made it possible to see it, made it possible to look over it. The occasional patrolling tank followed by GI’s doing their early morning practice I had to pass on my way to school reminded me from a very early age that I was growing up in a period of high tension. The harassment at the border reminded me that I was living on an artificial island surrounded by a concrete coral reef. Things didn’t feel weird, regardless of the Wall, the different tax system, the omnipresent Western allies and the possibility of getting conscripted into West Germany’s military service. Regardless of the cheap rent and the passports that didn’t indicate an official citizenship because they were devoid of any federal symbols, the tensions over the status of West Berlin that were ongoing, the GDR-controlled traffic between West Berlin and the western world and “Stasi” co-workers from the other side of the iron curtain infiltrating everyday life. Growing up in this rather surreal environment was the same as in any other bigger city. Teenage years in the so-called civilized world have the tendency to be rather awkward regardless of where you live, right?

But maybe it’s not true what I just stated, maybe growing up in West Berlin was very different. Due to its forced isolation the city was highly dependent on immigrant workers, so that’s why its population tends to be more open-minded. Maybe. Starting from the mid 70s musical heavyweights like David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Nick Cave spent years living in West Berlin. They described the city not only as heavily inspiring but as being the world’s biggest capital of heroin as well, so that’s why its population tends to have a borderline liaison dangereuse with hedonism. Maybe. Thanks to the Western allies, the city’s complicated political status and the pervasive presence of all kinds of authorities, a fertile ground for civil disobedience and alternative counter cultures were almost automatically nurtured. That’s why you’ll still find houses of squatters, irritatingly outspoken natives and hardly any franchises outside the tourist centres in this town.

Maybe. And since the first club experiences I had in the mid 80s were based on GI’s playing funk and early hip-hop --something that’s now marketed as “GI Disco” to a surprisingly successful level-- Berlin’s scene eventually took over the national charts simply because we were basically breast-fed with this kind of music and its accompanying attitude. Well, maybe.

My point is, if there’s an extinguishing point at all in this rambling mess, that Berlin is pretty much a capital of paradoxes. It’s a place breathing history 24/7, yet the jet-set visitors of this town simply see it as a playground for escapism devoid of any meaning. It’s no secret that Berlin is bankrupt, which not only makes it the perfect field for foreign investors, but also a Mecca for artists and drifters chasing their dreams. Also, the city allows you to land on your own two feet again, regardless if you made a major mistake or two. The days when Germany’s capital suffered from a kind of inferiority complex are over once and for all, the fall of the Berlin Wall kick-started a new chapter: We’re now in the spotlight, a serious cosmopolitan metropolis, at eye level with New York, London and Tokyo… gentrification and superficiality included. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not reminiscing over arguably good ol’ times. I’m just saying it’s worthwhile to catch your breath every once in a while and think about the bigger picture while you’re feverishly racing through this town, my town, looking for opportunities and the next kick. As Plato once put it, “This city is what it is because our citizens are what they are.” Well, at least ‘til the next low-budget carrier arrives. And who knows… maybe I’m learning a valuable lesson and will join your swarm of locusts when you’re ready to pitch into the next (assumingly) big thing. Prost to that.

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