Jewish Museum Berlin

The Jewish Museum Berlin tells the story of Jewish life in Germany from the Middle Ages to the present, and its building is as much a reason to visit as its exhibitions. The museum occupies two very different structures in Kreuzberg: the Collegienhaus, a baroque building of 1735 that once housed the Berlin Museum, and the zinc-clad extension by Daniel Libeskind, with its sharp zigzag plan and slashed windows, which opened in September 2001.

There is no door into the Libeskind building from the street. You enter through the baroque building and descend underground to a series of sloping axes. One leads to the Holocaust Tower, a tall, bare concrete space lit only by a slit in the roof. Another leads outside to the Garden of Exile, where olive willows grow on top of 49 tall concrete pillars on a tilted base, so the ground never feels level. In one of the voids that cut through the building lies Shalekhet (Fallen Leaves) by Menashe Kadishman, thousands of steel faces that clang as you walk across them.

The core exhibition, Jewish Life in Germany: Past and Present, covers religious practice, everyday life, emancipation, persecution and the post-war community, using objects, documents, media stations and personal stories. It is designed to be explored at your own pace, and temporary exhibitions run alongside it, including one on Libeskind and the building itself. Across the road, ANOHA is the museum's children's world, built around a huge wooden Noah's Ark, and is a good choice for families with younger children.

The museum is open Tuesday to Sunday from 10am to 6pm, with last admission at 5pm, and it is closed on Mondays. Reserving a time-slot ticket online is recommended, though walk-in tickets are sold at the desk; ANOHA can only be visited with a time-slot ticket. Expect a security check at the entrance. Allow at least two to three hours, as the building and exhibition are large. There is a café, and the museum garden is a pleasant place to rest.

The nearest U-Bahn stations are Hallesches Tor (U1 and U6) and Kochstrasse (U6), each about ten minutes' walk. Checkpoint Charlie and the Topography of Terror are a short walk to the north, and the restaurants of Kreuzberg are close by.