Das Stue, Berlin

We arrived at the beautiful Das Stue hotel in Berlin on a chilly afternoon and were immediately greeted with the sight of a giant alligator's skull. Alright, I thought, nodding to myself. This place has character. And it does. It's with good reason Das Stue, housed in the former Royal Danish Embassy, centres around an animal theme - half the rooms look out over enclosures at the Berlin Zoo. Our first room, in fact, had a wonderful view of an ostrich and antelope enclosure. It felt surreal, staring down at the ostriches who, in turn, were gazing quizzically up at us.

I say 'first room' because we requested an upgrade (which we were owed anyway but they'd forgotten to give us) to a larger room, mainly because the windows were not reflective and passersby could see directly into the room. The second one had no such issue and came equipped with a large terrace; unfortunately it was far too cold to use it.

I ordered a tortilla de patatas for lunch, we reclined and watched TV for a while, then set off to explore the rest of the hotel.



The only part of the hotel not quite up to standard is the gym - tiny, unmanned (as the spa itself often was during our stay) and quite warm. You do get to watch the ostriches though whilst you work out, which is amusing.

We opted to stay indoors that night, hoping for dinner at Casual by Paco Perez, one of the two restaurants at Das Stue (the main one was closed during our stay). However, we were told there were unfortunately no free tables and wouldn't be any for a while, for hotel guests or not. To make up for this, we were given complimentary cocktails and seated in the lounge for an hour.






By the time we went to speak to the maître d' again, there were still empty tables available and we were finally seated. Not very organised!

The food, on the other hand, was impressive. 

We sat back in our chairs, full and satisfied, and headed up for a restful night of sleep. The next morning, I awoke to find a decent amount of snow had fallen overnight and the world had turned into a white wonderland. After finally succeeding in dragging poor, tired Jarv out of bed, we ventured downstairs back to Casual for breakfast.

Their buffet spread was pretty decent - they even had kombucha! There's also a breakfast menu to choose from, with delectable options such as bircher muesli, fresh crepes, eggs Florentine, eggs with guac, eggs with jamón ibérico...lots of eggs.

After a good hour or so of gobbling up all the food we were able to cram into our bellies, we made our way back to the room. I must say, this was the first time in my life I spent the entire weekend trip at a hotel and not out and about in the city. Obviously easier done given we'd seen Berlin in the summertime already and it's less than a 2 hour flight away. 

So, we snuggled up in bed to watch more TV, ordered lunch to the room and ended the weekend with a walk in the snow around the Tiergarten outside the hotel before calling a taxi to the airport.

If you're looking for an intimate stay with generously sized rooms (for a boutique city hotel), great food and eclectic decor, look no further. Das Stue is a stylish, high end hotel nestled in the heart of Berlin, bursting with character and charm.