From techno temples to hedonistic hideouts, anything-goes revelry has been core to Berlin’s soul for the past century. But rising rents and rapid gentrification may soon kill the party.

Paris has fashion, Copenhagen has design, Berlin has clubs. From multi-day raves in former Cold War bunkers to hedonistic hideouts where anything goes and phones are banned, the German capital has been luring libertines and showing the world how to party since its decadent Weimar days a century ago.

That’s why Germany added Berlin’s techno scene to the country’s national registry of Intangible Culture in March 2024. It was a nod to the music’s role as the soundtrack of Berlin’s counter-cultural core – the same one that helped topple the Berlin Wall; lead its former mayor to declare it “poor but sexy“; and, until recently, stave off large-scale gentrification.

But in November, a non-profit organisation representing the interests of Berlin clubs, released a report warning that half of the city’s roughly 250 clubs are at risk of closing in 2025 due to Berlin’s rapidly rising rents, gentrification and changing demographics – a figure that has doubled since club owners surveyed nine months earlier