We show you the queer Berlin.

The queer city tour in Berlin

Our KiezTour is for everyone — Berliners, newcomers and visitors alike — who want to experience Europe's oldest queer quarter and its 140 years of history in an entertaining way, with the occasional culinary surprise. On our four-hour walk we take you through the Rainbow Quarter (Regenbogenkiez) around Nollendorfplatz, in the heart of Berlin-Schöneberg.

We pass legendary places, explore quirky scene bars, take a look inside fetish stores, cross the paths of "Emil and the Detectives", taste a few local treats, and travel through history — from Berlin's founding years and the first German gay rights movement, through the golden 20s, life under the Nazi dictatorship, the iconic 80s and on to the present day. We show you how vital queer venues have been as safe spaces — and why this warm, open, tolerant neighbourhood is worth protecting.

We tell you stories you won't find in any history book, and turn the evening into something genuinely memorable — funny, sociable, and a little bit cheeky. Because some bars and venues only allow visitors aged 18+, all participants need to be of age at the start of the tour.

Our guides are well-known Berlin drag queens — either born and raised here or so deeply connected with this city that they bring the neighbourhood to life. The tours are currently led by Margot Schlönzke, Anna Klatsche, Victoria Bacon and Helen de Nore, among others. Best to book your ticket early — places per tour are limited.

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What makes the KiezTour special

Berlin has many city tours. What sets the KiezTour apart is hard to capture in one sentence — it's the mix: real Berlin drag queens, one single quarter, dense queer history, and a tone somewhere between history class and stage performance. Concretely:

• Real drag queens as guides. Not script-following tour guides, but Berlin drag personalities who actually live and work in the quarter.
• Focus on the Nollendorf area. We don't show you all of Berlin in four hours — we go deep into one single quarter, the Rainbow Quarter around Nollendorfplatz in Schöneberg.
• 140+ years of queer history. From Berlin's founding years through the golden 20s, life under Nazi dictatorship, CSD, the AIDS crisis and today's community.
• Bars, shops and scene venues from the inside. We go into queer bars, fetish stores and Berlin classics — the tour does not stay on the street.
• Memorial sites with substance. We talk about the places where queer people were persecuted and murdered — without pathos, but with the seriousness they deserve.
• Knowledge, humour and neighbourhood feeling, all at once. The KiezTour is not a dry walking tour — it's a mix of historical walk, queer stand-up performance and quarter ramble.

You can read about the drag queens leading the tours on our guides page.

What you'll experience on the tour

The KiezTour does not have a fixed route — like a living neighbourhood, it changes. Some bars are part of every tour, others depend on the date, season and mood. These themes and places, however, come up regularly:

• Nollendorfplatz. The historical centre of queer Berlin — including the memorial plaque for homosexual victims of the Nazi regime at the U-Bahn station.
• Motzstraße & Fuggerstraße. Two streets where queer bars, cafés and shops cluster like almost nowhere else in Germany.
• Queer bars and scene classics. We visit places that have been home to queer Berlin for decades — including stories about owners, regulars and legendary nights.
• Fetish shops and specialist stores. The quarter is home to some of Europe's most well-known leather and fetish stores. We go in, look around, and explain why all of this exists in such a small area.
• Memorial and remembrance places. Squares, plaques and references to what the quarter went through in the 20th century.
• Traces of Christopher Isherwood and "Emil and the Detectives". Schöneberg is a literary and film backdrop — we show you where that becomes tangible.
• Today's community. The quarter is no museum — it is alive. We also talk about how Schöneberg is changing right now.

You can find a curated selection of the venues we visit on our locations page. Background on the quarter as a whole is in our article on the Rainbow Quarter.

Who is the KiezTour for?

The KiezTour brings together a fairly mixed crowd — that's part of the design. On a typical tour you'll find Berlin visitors next to long-time Schöneberg residents, queer travellers next to allies, birthday groups next to culture lovers. It works precisely because the Rainbow Quarter has always been a place where very different lives existed side by side.

• Berlin visitors who want more than the Brandenburg Gate and Mauerpark.
• Queer travellers who want to know where queer Berlin actually started.
• Groups of friends looking for a sociable, slightly different evening in Berlin.
• Locals who want to really get to know the neighbourhood on their doorstep.
• Birthdays, hen/stag parties and private groups — book a private tour and have the quarter to yourselves.
• Companies and teams for whom diversity is not just a marketing label.
• Allies who want to do more than post their solidarity.

You don't have to be queer to join the KiezTour — being respectful and curious is enough. If you'd like to give the tour as a present, you'll find a gift voucher option here.

Common questions about the KiezTour

See tour dates and book

More background on the quarter: queer locations · our drag queen guides · all FAQs · queer Berlin blog