KaDeWe opened at Wittenbergplatz in 1907 with goods and services that brought international shopping into a new Berlin department store. Its scale and changing interiors reflect the growth of City West, while its history also carries the rupture of Nazi expropriation and wartime destruction.
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A department store can tell a story about what a city wanted to become. Adolf Jandorf opened Kaufhaus des Westens—KaDeWe—at Wittenbergplatz in 1907, introducing a huge range of goods from Germany and abroad to Berlin shoppers.
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UpgradeQuick facts
- Adolf Jandorf opened KaDeWe on 27 March 1907.
- The store originally occupied five floors and covered 24,000 square metres.
- The Hertie group was forcibly expropriated by the Nazi regime in 1933.
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