​Gravestone honouring shuttered Berlin club Watergate placed outside venue

A gravestone honouring Berlin nightclub Watergate has been placed outside the venue, just a month after it was shuttered due to financial pressures.

The memorial was erected last week outside the venue on Falckensteinstraße, next to the River Spree, where the venue sat for more than 22 years.

Reading ‘Watergate 2002 – 2024’ across the gravestone head, the memorial honours the “thriving, cultural, diverse life” in Berlin, following the venue’s closure in December.

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The tombstone was erected by anonymous Berlin group Steinzeit.alter – AKA Stone Age – who memorialise shuttered cultural institutions across the German capital.

“Where a name is written on a stone, the soul lives on,” they wrote on Instagram last week alongside videos and photos of it being placed outside the venue.

“Given the fact that we’ve had to swap countless clubs in office space over the last few years, it’s just as important to remember as it once was.”

“We would like to draw attention especially to the topic of ‘club deaths’ and start a movement that provokes people of this city, whether they are residents or tourists, to think.”

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In September, Watergate confirmed that it would close permanently at the end of 2024 after 22 years, citing financial pressures and high overhead costs such as energy prices and rising rent.

Venue co-founder Ulrich Wombacher told Resident Advisor: “Now that we see things going in a different direction, it’s time for us to take this last step. Continuing blindly without sense or reason and risking an uncontrolled financial decline is out of the question for us.”

Check out a video of the gravestone being placed below.

Gemma Ross is Mixmag’s Assistant Editor, follow her on Twitter