It even happens in Berlin that taxi drivers don't know a hotel because it's so new.

When we arrive in front of the telegraph office on Monbijoustrasse, the driver looks at the stately old building and asks in amazement whether we're in the right place.

The old main telegraph office, which opened here in 1916 and was Berlin's pneumatic tube post office for decades, has retained its neo-baroque facade.

Only inside has a lot happened since the "Borchardt" owner Roland Mary decided to convert the building into a hotel with a restaurant.

Maria Wiesner

Style Coordinator.

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The old substance was preserved;

the lobby welcomes the guests in warm light under vaulted arches that soar up to the more than three meter high Berlin cap ceiling.

"We are proud to be in an old building," says Enrico Maschek, one of the opening directors of the house alongside Albrecht Heine.

Maschek explains that the concept was both to evoke the old function of the house and to capture stylish Berlin from the 1920s to the 1970s.

It's become a wild mix, he says, and begins the tour of the building.

champagne and craft beer

Even the elevator shows what he means by that: the interior is lined in copper-colored, wire mesh elements stretch across the walls, one almost assumes to be dropped off directly in the Golden Twenties.

When the door opens, a mixture of industrial charm and design hotel awaits you instead: old steel beams on the ceiling, brick peeks out from under the plaster and contrasts with warm gray tones in the hallway and brass signs on the doors.

Interesting ideas have also been incorporated into the furnishing of the rooms.

Comfortable, retro-looking armchairs stand in front of a floor-to-ceiling window, a long, minimalist desk offers space and enough connections for laptops and other electronics, the cables of which disappear under the tilting worktop.

The wardrobe is also hidden behind the mirror paneling of the entrance area.

Right next to it is the well-stocked bar, which really no longer deserves the prefix mini: Ruinart champagne next to craft beer, salted popcorn next to vegan gummy bears.

Instead of capsule coffee machines, they bought kettles and found someone in the Berlin roastery "The Barn" who, thanks to Ethiopian beans, turned the long-spurned instant coffee into a drinkable drink.

Should one be encouraged to stay longer at the Hotel Telegraphenamt?

Maschek smiles: Berlin in this central location tends to be a starting point for day tourists and short-term visitors.

There are 97 rooms available for them, including two large maisonette apartments if you want to stay longer or hold larger work meetings in private rooms.

The smaller suites look out of large windows at the adjoining Monbijoupark and at the inner courtyard, under the dome of which the "Root" restaurant has moved.

In the basement there are decorative remains of the pneumatic tube system, above which nimble waiters serve Asian delicacies and German cuisine at white-covered tables: burgers, pea soup or curry as well as sushi platters with regional fish.

A sushi master from Japan prepares them in the open kitchen.

Yes, yes - you could definitely stay longer here.