Berlin´s Street Names and Their History
Street names seem like a given—yet they are the result of political decisions, social negotiations, and sometimes heated debates.
Image gallery
Die Polizei entfernt am 2. Oktober 1994 die vom Aktiven Museum angebrachte Zusatztafel zur Clara-Zetkin-Straße.
The Mitte Museum’s new special exhibition takes a closer look at Berlin’s street history and asks: What does a street name reveal about the time when it was given? And what does it say about us when we keep it—or change it?
The exhibition is part of “Rename?!”—a two-year exhibition project jointly organized by twelve Berlin district and regional museums. The Active Museum coordinates the project and supports the initiative as a partner. Each district museum supplements the shared modules with a specific focus on local history.
The Mitte district offers a particularly insightful starting point for this: as an inner-city district that unites former East and West Berlin districts, continuities and breaks are especially palpable here. Some street names from the Nazi era or the GDR still exist today—while others, seemingly innocuous, were changed long ago. Why? Who decides this, and how? A special focus is placed on the history of initiatives, associations, and engaged citizens who have initiated, supported, or even prevented renaming processes.
Rename?! sees itself as a contribution to the debate: To what extent are political power relations reflected in the naming of streets and squares? What democratic potential do moderated discourses on renaming hold? And what forms of identification do street names enable in the first place?
The exhibition opens on May 21 and will be on view at the Mitte Museum from May 22 through September 27, 2026.
