Renate

An empty block next to the Elsenbrücke, with a reputation as a former brothel and a kebab shop on the ground floor, ended up becoming one of the most recognizable clubbing labyrinths in Friedrichshain. In 2007 a group from the scene was looking for a warehouse for open-air equipment and stumbled upon Alt-Stralau 70. What was meant to be a storage room opened, floor by floor, as Renate.

A kebab shop, a warehouse and a house with no closed doors

The first weekend only one floor was operational. Then came the Green and Red floors: rooms that during the week remained living quarters or backstage and on Saturday dissolved into the party. The kebab shop was transformed into a cloakroom. For years the venue was called Salon zur Wilden Renate: less a nightclub with an open floor plan than an unrenovated house turned into a club, with hallways, nooks and the feeling of having entered a private party that never ends. In the nineties the building had been squatted.

The labyrinth that got inside the party

In 2009 they integrated a pub at the entrance and, after months of construction, the Peristal Singum opened, the immersive labyrinth by Karmanoia: a psychedelic installation of recycled objects that tens of thousands of people passed through until March 2014. The same house has been a stage for theater (Renate Horror Picture Show), the Miss Renate pageant, the opera Dido and Aeneas in the garden (Kiez Oper, 2012) and, since 2016, House of Lunacy, queer and sex-positive nights with themes and costumes. In 2020, Overmorrow occupied the interior with an art tour during the pandemic lockdown.

The Green opens and Kirsch enters the house

The programming is based on house, techno, disco and electro, with a door policy more permeable than other Berlin icons and a team that today pushes local talent and collective takeovers. In 2026 the Green Floor was reopened without partitions, with an L-shaped dance floor, a new booth, a stage for live acts and drag, and a custom Kirsch Audio system, warm and punchy, with an extra horn above the booth. The rest of the house—the red room, the boat bar, the alcoves—was retouched without flattening the chaos.

The contract that arrived two weeks before the end

In August 2024 the club announced that the lease was not being renewed. In June 2025 a fire destroyed the garden and the fence; the main building held up and reopened that same day. On December 15, two weeks before the eviction, a ten-year contract arrived. After a break and weekday renovations, the full reopening was in April 2026. The garden functions as a neighborhood space: Fridays from 16:00 and Saturdays from 14:00, with free open-air parties. Inside, a no-photography policy applies and payment is card-only.