Check into a Beetle for a night in Berlin

Independent on Sunday (UK) - June 10, 2001

A lilac Volkswagen Beetle 1200, circa 1973, is the latest addition to Berlin's unique "art hotel" scene, having been turned into a double bed for visitors at the youth hostel Baxpax in the trendy Kreuzberg district.

Petra Rusche, the previous owner of the car, could not bear to consign it to the scrapheap so gave it to the hostel, a refurbished factory building owned by Andreas Zelck and Olaf Juhl, on Skalitzer Strasse.

The Beetle now has a room of its own - its boot has become a cupboard and the seats have been removed to accommodate guests, probably not taller than 1.9 meters.

Michael Helmerich, spokesman for the German tourist board, welcomed the new art hotel trend. He said: "We have had 40 years behind the Iron Curtain and now we are catching up with other European cities. The number of beds in Berlin has doubled in the past 10 years."

Art hotels, ranging from pricey hotels to cheaper youth hostels, have caught on in recent years. Berlin's burgeoning roster of quirky hotels includes Propeller Island City Lodge Hotel, which has 27 rooms designed by Lars Stroschen, the Ermelerhaus, the Pro Arte Hotel in Friedrichstrasse, and Sorat's Art 'otel, which features works by Fluxus artist Wolf Vostell.

sent in by Pete Frost