Funkturm Berlin

The Berliner Funkturm is a 150-meter steel-lattice broadcasting tower in the Charlottenburg exhibition grounds, designed by Heinrich Straumer and inaugurated at Germany's third radio exhibition in 1926. The slender steel mast became an emblem of the Weimar Republic's broadcast era — from here, the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft transmitted Germany's first experimental television broadcasts starting in 1929, a milestone in European media history. Requisitioned during World War II as an air traffic control tower for the nearby airfield, it emerged largely undamaged. Today visitors reach the 126-meter observation deck by elevator for sweeping views across western Berlin and the adjacent trade-fair grounds. The restaurant at 55 meters is one of Germany's few surviving tower restaurants, pairing engineering history with an atmospheric elevated dining experience.