KaDeWe Berlin

 Today we went to KaDeWe in Berlin. It is the largest department store on the European continent. Before our tour we had some time to kill and so just took a seat. Left to right: Breahna, Me, Heath, P.J., and Chris.

After my camera took the picture before this one, Heath got GW to take a picture of us with his Camera. I think that Patrick did something funny, and so Heath was showing P.J. the picture.

 Now you see P.J and Chris laughing and Patrick doing what he was doing in the picture. I don't know how well you can see him...but he is hilarious.

 Then GW decided to do a cartwheel..

 It started to rain a little and Heath and P.J. shared the little umbrella. P.J. is loooving it..

 And now KaDeWe. This stands for Kaufhaus de Westens which means Department Store of the West. It was built in 1907, and has had been repaired over the years, obviously, but especially after a fire from WWII bombings. On the first floor is "Luxury Row." I don't if you can see in the picture but there was Gucci, Chanel, Louis Vuitton.

 And here you can see them all...we looked around for a little while and it was unbelievable, just so so expensive.

 A peak inside some of these boutiques. KaDeWe is one of the 3 "premium" department stores that is owned by Karstadt. That means that these stores have buyers that handpick the inventory and the prices reflect this. The regular Karstadt department stores have basic inventory that is common throughout each store. The stores on luxury row pay to be in the KaDeWe a percentage of their sales. The tour guide said that it is mutually beneficial because KaDeWe can say, "of course we have Chanel." And Chanel can say, "Of course we are in KaDeWe." The KaDeWe employs 2000 workers, not including the luxury stores.

 In the center of the 1st floor they always spotlight a certain brand. Right now it is Polo.

 Tiffany & Co.

 The tour guide showed us these cell phones. The one on the left has diamonds, and the one on the right is made of  8 Karat gold. They have a concierge service that you can call and basically have them do whatever you want. There are different packages, but the highest package would allow this concierge to travel with you and basically be your personal secretary. The first year this service is free and then the basic package would be 2100 Euro. The phones are so expensive but I can't remember an exact amount. 

 The tour guide also showed us the most expensive perfume in the store. Just the little bottle of perfume, not counting the bottle would be 600 Euro. I'm pretty sure a regular size was in the thousands. They wouldn't let us smell it because it was too expensive to give out samples. But really if you're going to buy that you don't care what it smells like, you just care that it is the most expensive perfume in the store. The tour guide said it really didn't smell that great, that it was way too strong because it was made from straight oil of flower, no alcohol added.

 All of these sparklies are Swarkovski crystals.

 She took us through floor by floor.

 It was so cool to see all these huge labels. Hugo Boss.

 In the back they have a fitting room for custom suits. She couldn't take us back there but if one of the guys wanted to come back and get fitted, there would be complementary champagne.









Versace. Most of this stuff didn't have price tags. Mostly because if you have to ask how much it costs, you can't afford it.

 Armani.

 Dolce and Gabbana.

 Ralph Lauren Black Label.

 This area is often used for runway fashion shows, but can also be used for sales and other displays.

 You can see the fuchsia lights around the top. The tour guide said this is for that season's color. So everything will pretty much center around a berry color for this season. It will change every season.

 Burberry. She said that the woman's level is what brings in the most profit for the whole department store. If it does poorly, the dept. store does poorly.










There was half of an entire level devoted just to lingerie. Look at this thongs. The string is pearls! haha.

 Dolce and Gabbana lingerie.

 The next floor was glassware.

 Very pretty porcelain plates.

 This is the second most expensive item in the whole department store. It is just a cup and saucer, but it is a collector's item. You can see the price is 45,000 Euro. That means it is almost $650,000!

 This is Samsonite luggage. It is made out of Carbon fiber so it is super strong and durable but very very light. BMW is going to start making their cars out of this material, they showed us when we toured the factory. It is pretty expensive of course, but really worth it I think if you do a lot of traveling.







On one of the top floors they sell raw meats. They have it divided out by where it is from. So this meat is from Berlin.

 And this is from Spain. There were meats from all over Germany and Europe, and the world really.

 Ok so this meat is from cows that are fed beer, and massaged regularly. They aren't allowed to walk or run so as not to develop muscles. Therefore this meat is so so tender...and expensive. The price says 280 and 220 Euro.

 There were also all kinds of wines. Many of these are late 1800s early 1900s. One price says 4500 Euro.

 There is also a bakery, and everything made there is from recipes by the French Chef Lenotre. The flour and other ingredients also come from France.

 The tour guide said that everything tastes as good as it looks. And it looks awesome!

Godiva Chocolatier :)

The top of the KaDeWe has a sky bar. This is the view.  And that was the end of our time at KaDeWe. We had the option to stay and shop but there the tour guide said she didn't even shop there because it is too expensive. Plus anything I would buy would be the price times 1.5. So I wasn't really that interested. It was amazing to see what people are willing to pay, and can afford. Apparently they make most of their money from 20% of their visitors who are from Russia and the United Arab Emirates, and China. Where does Russia get it's money? She said Americans used to be part of this group, but not anymore. She said you can have anything you want at KaDeWe, at a price. At any one time 14,000-16,000 people are in the KaDeWe. Most people are probably just window shopping. Sometimes its fun to have one or two pieces that are luxury, but I can't imagine keeping up with the trends in this stuff. But really some people just have more money than they know what to do with I guess. It was definitely an interesting experience. Cool to see so much opulence in one place.

 After KaDeWe we went shopping in "more affordable" places. I really really wanted to buy some clothes, but I just thought back to how full my closet is at home...and how full my suitcase is! haha. In the area near our hotel there are a lot of shops and a lot of street musicians and dancers. Here there is a guy making enormous bubbles. We also stood and watched some guys dancing. It was pretty funny, I'm gonna post a video of that on Facebook so look out for that. After shopping we went and ate some Oriental food. We found a cheap buffet! Another thing I miss about Texas...buffets that you can just eat til your heart's content, haha. This place we ate today was really pretty good. It is kind of hard to find a place with a lot of food for cheap. Like today I ate well at the free hotel breakfast so that I could not eat lunch and save money. Anyway, tomorrow we have a Fat Bike Tour of Berlin. It's gonna be really fun I think, and good weather. It will last from 11-3 I think. Berlin is a cool place, but definitely more big city than Leipzig. The good thing is that a lot more people speak English. Today on the Subway I was asking one of the girls in our group about if we knew where to get off. The boy sitting beside me asked where we were going and told us the right way to get there. His dad was from Milwaukee but his mom was German and so he grew up in Germany but spoke great English. Tonight we have just been hanging out inside. There is probably great night life in Berlin, haha, but probably not very safe. Hard to believe I'll be home in about a week and a half! The last part of this trip is gonna fly. Wednesday we go to Oxford, England. Friday in London where we will spend the weekend. We are going to see Chicago on Broadway!!!!! Then Monday back in Oxford, and Thursday home. Woah. :)