by Louisa Stovyesky

I’m not really one for parties and drinking, however, I made it a point to come to a party I was invited to while studying in Frankfurt, Germany because the venue was a famous trendy hotel I have always wanted to see.

I’ve heard a lot of nice things about the Pure hotel in Frankfurt from my fellow interior design classmates who have seen the inside of the hotel and told me of really sleek, clean and purist rooms, lobbies, restaurants and bars in the hotel. I’ve also seen some pictures although of course, they always left more than half of the details and beauty that a room can afford if viewed personally.

And so, I left of my draftings and projects for just one night in order to attend a party that I would surely enjoy not because of the entertainment, drinks and company, but because of my curiosity for the venue.

And I have to say that I was not at all disappointed. Pure, Frankfurt offered a lot of interesting architectural ideas and interior design details that I would love to incorporate to future projects of mine. I have a philosophy, although I must own up that it is probably not that original and many have said it before, that a room is beautiful if it makes you feel wonderful being in it and being see in it.

And the Pure Bar in Pure Hotel, Frankfurt was a place I felt amazing to be in. All you would see are clean lines from the ceilings to the furniture. Every corner and everything is also impeccably white creating a total sense of purity and calm.

For a very lively place filled with a crowd of fashionable clubbers, the Pure Bar remained completely perfect and fantastic which made my sacrifice to leave my little den very much worth the trouble of wearing stilettos and smiling to people I didn’t even know all night.

by Cassandra Romjin

Frankfurt, Germany is not really one of the top ten cities in the planet that would instantly come to mind when one mentions the word “nightclub”. But unknown to some, this German city of ours is home to one of the world’s best nightclubs ever.

Whether you are German or not, as long as you are a fan of dance music and clubbing, then you must definitely known who Sven Väth is. If you don’t, well then Sven Väth is no one really, just the best and most celebrated DJ in all of Germany. You can be clubbing in Berlin or in some obscure part of the country but you must and you should known Sven Väth and his music.

But enough of the Sven Väth worshiping. Aside from being the best DJ there is in Germany, Sven is also the owner of a fantastic, awe-inspiring, incredibly amazing nightclub in Frankfurt called the Cocoon Club.

This almost 30,000 square feet club features a mind boggling, uber cool décor that would leave even the most choosy of clubbers at their knees. Everything from the laser light shows, futuristic VIP section, glowing podium, ultra modern cocoon pod-like spaces, and honeycombed walls shout fabulous and inventive. It is also tremendously spacious, so spacious in fact that the place has three bars.

But the Cocoon Club’s most interesting feature would have to be its sound system. Since Sven Väth is the genius behind the club, he made sure the entire place is perfect for playing music. The walls, ceilings, layout and furniture placement was all determined with the main objective of improving the sound system. And of course, they also brought in all the high tech technologies and even customized sound system gadgets to be able to produce high quality music.

The only thing I am not at all contented about with regards to this nightclub is the fact that it is only open on Fridays and Saturdays which leaves me missing the fun and excitement during the other 5 days of the week. So the next time you visit Frankfurt, especially if its a Friday or a Saturday, you might just want to skip the opera or the ballet and head down to the Cocoon Club instead for a party you would never forget orchestrated by the clubbing master himself, Sven Väth!

by Angeli Muscherte

Although the lives of many fashion conscious people revolve around the catwalks of New York, Paris and Milan, here in Germany, we take out style and fashion senses to the streets.

If you have ever visited Berlin, Düsseldorf or Hamburg, you would be surprised at just how interesting normal people dress and present themselves. If you do not feel like sitting at home in front of the television watching stick thin models strut around in thousand dollar dresses, then what you should do is to find a comfortable bench in a park or at a sidewalk and watch the people passing along for interesting, fantastic, amazing, weird and out-of-this-world fashions.

I for one have found this to be a really interesting and enjoyable thing to do. Today for instance, I have seen a girl wearing a totally sheer dress and walking around as if everyone else could not see her barely clad body. There was also a teenager who was wearing an interesting coat and who told me when I asked him about it that it belonged to his grandfather. A woman wearing a checkered jumpsuit and vintage sun glasses also caught my interest as well as a lady in a large, parachute-like dress.

Yes, they may not be as glamorous as New York women nor are they as sexy and hip as those in Los Angeles. They are not as chic as the mademoiselles of Paris and these men and women are also not as put together and pristine as the models who strut around on Milan’s catwalks.

However, that does not mean that street fashion in Germany is not inspired and interesting. In fact, I get a lot of inspiration and ideas from what people on Germany’s streets wear and I use these ideas to create the garments I need to make for fashion school.

To limit their style and personality to a single word such as edgy, chic, or elegant would be like closing the box brimming with an endless store of personality and taste. Germans enjoy wearing their heart on their sleeves and you can really see the vibrance and life of German style and fashion not on the fashion catwalks, but on the streets and sidewalks of this fair country.

by Sophie Ashdale

There I was in my office, finishing the last page of my report and minding my own business when my best friend suddenly burst into the room. Maybe it was my disheveled hair or the many layers of eyebags under my eyes which have been the result of five straight days and nights of non-stop working which caused her to gape at me as if I was some caged circus attraction or something. She saw how stressed and tired I was so she decided I should give myself a break and go sunbathing at the park with her.

I idea sounded promising. Aside from being able to sleep outdoors where the fresh air can cleanse out the stress in me and the golden bright sun can lend a hint of gold to my deathly pale skin, I may possibly scan the park for a couple of hot sunbathing guys with 6 packs while I’m at it.

She decided to take me to the Englischer Garten, a nearby park here in Munich which is said to be bigger than our Central Park back home in New York. I have actually never been in that park before but I have heard nothing but praise from my German classmates in the university who have grown up being able to visit the Englischer Garten every few weeks or so.

Schönfeldwiese or the Beautiful Meadows was really what its name says, beautiful. This sunbathing area in the park had a breathtaking scenery that instantly relaxed me the moment I saw it. But this calming sensation was quickly replaced by shock and embarrassment when a withered looking old man completely in the nude passed by.

“Is he senile” Did he lose his clothes? An exhibitionist, perhaps?”

Apparently not. After a quick glance around the park, I saw that everyone was in the nude. It was like being in the Garden of Eden except that most of the people are not as sexy and in shape as how I had imagine Adam and Eve to have been.

I didn’t know that Schönfeldwiese in the Englischer Garten was a social nudist garden. Locals and tourists have apparently been coming here to sunbath in their birthday suits for some time now and the entire concept is legal and accepted in Germany.

Naturally, I hesitated. I haven’t gone to the gym for quite sometime now and the chips and sausages I ate while working on my report did not really improve my physique. But seeing how everyone seemed comfortable and oblivious to the bulges and wrinkles on the body of the person sunbathing around them, my hesitation quickly dissipated and for a few hours, I enjoyed complete and utter freedom and relaxation.

by Ryan Koya Atanasov

I’ve been here in Cologne for more than 2 weeks now and I have already sworn off sausages for life. I had no idea how much a part of almost every meal sausages are here in Germany.

For the past two weeks, I have had at least one type of sausage everyday. There were even a couple of times when I had a meal at breakfast, lunch, dinner and snack time and all these meals featured a sausage of some sorts. I’m not saying they’re not delicious, because they are. Even the gross sounding blood sausages that my friend’s grandparents served us and that I was forced to eat in order not to seem rude were surprisingly delicious.

However, the idea of eating some sort of sausage everyday can be disturbing to me since I am not used to all these different types of sausages and we were not really taught to appreciate sausages in Russia.

It is interesting though, just how many ways all these different types of sausages can be served and eaten. I’ve had sausages served with pretzel, sweet mustard and beer. Then there was also this meal I ate which had a sausage, a portion of mashed apples and a kind of gravy-like sauce. We were also served pasta with bits of sausages, potatoes and bacon at a certain restaurant, while in another we order a kind of sausage served with soup and vegetables.

Ok, so they do taste good and the variety can be interesting. But celebrating a Sausage Fest is kind of over the top don’t you think? There was also a sausage fest held in a town near Cologne which we visited and it was there that I have seen the most number of sausages I ever saw in my entire life.

It was fun though, and the food, especially the sausages, was great. But after this trip, I’ll probably lay of the sausages for a very long time.

by Jacob Inglebright

No one can compete with the Germans when it comes to beer. For some reason, they have perfected almost everything connected with beer, whether its making beer, selling beer, and of course, consuming beer.

Aside from an industry revolving around beer, I have also learned during all my travels to Germany that its people have developed an entire culture based on beer. I have even heard this seemingly famous quote that is well known among many Germans that goes like this, “ Beer transforms thirst into a very beautiful thing”.

And if you think about it, it really does. I have been to beer gardens in Munich, Berlin, Dresden and Cologne, and in all these German cities I found such a welcoming and lively crowd inside every beer garden I went into. And these are not just locals but the guests at German beer gardens are often composed of a very diverse international crowd.

As many of you would have guessed, I have also witnessed several times the spectacle that is the famous Oktoberfest. The first one I have ever attended was in Berlin and I have to say I was completely blown away by the sheer number of visitors and the tremendous amounts of beer all mixed together during those few but fantastic days.

Forget the fancy cars, advance scientific know-how and the ingenious educational system. When in Germany, do what the Germans do best and discover what the perfect beer experience should really be like.