Nikolaikirche (Berlin)

Nikolaikirche in central Berlin is the oldest intact church building in the capital; its first stone hall church was built around 1230, shortly after the founding of Berlin, and the brick Gothic core remains largely legible today. In the 19th century the previously separate towers were given the distinctive twin-spire helm. The church burned out in the Second World War; reconstruction took place from 1980 to 1987 for East Berlin's 750th anniversary, by which time the church (deconsecrated in 1938) was no longer a parish church. It now belongs to the Berlin City Museum Foundation and houses a permanent exhibition on the city's history with the original late Gothic high altar and the epitaphs of several Berlin mayors. Regular concerts make use of the full acoustics of the tall nave.