Experiences
A small calendar of things we are quite serious about.
Most of these run weekly. A few are seasonal. All are bookable through the concierge or — for guests in the building — at the front desk. Bring shoes you don't mind sitting cross-legged in.
On property
Lockpicking 101 — Wednesdays, 19:00–21:00
A two-hour, hands-on introduction to mechanical pin-tumbler locks, in the basement workshop, led by our resident locksmith Schuyler Townes. Six benches, six padlocks, a stack of practice cylinders, and a long discussion about why old locks are easier and what that tells us about everything else. €40 per person, includes a take-home practice lock. Maximum six guests; book early. TOOOL Berlin chapter members welcome at half price.
Soldering Salon — Thursdays, 18:00–21:00
A drop-in soldering bench. Bring something to fix; or build the small kit we provide (a blinky badge based on an ATtiny85, designed by Lukas Mehring of our maintenance team). Coffee and Augustiner on the bench; Hakko FX-888D stations, leaded and lead-free solder, fume extractor. Free for hotel guests; €15 for walk-ins; the kit is €18.
Cryptography Sundays — Sundays, 15:00, in the library
Afternoon tea (Sironi scones, two jams, clotted cream from Devon, a pot of Kleines Blatt Darjeeling) with a small lecture on a historical cipher: Caesar, Vigenère, Playfair, Enigma, the Beale ciphers, the Voynich Manuscript, whatever a guest lecturer brings that month. €38 per person; €30 for hotel guests. Children twelve and over welcome.
The Signal Sauna
In the basement, beside the workshop, a small two-person sauna lined with copper mesh and a copper grounding strap to the building's earth bus. Phones genuinely do not work inside. A small printed card on the bench reads:
You are now in receive-only mode. Stay 15 minutes. Then drink water.
Free for hotel guests; €25 for walk-ins; book at the front desk. Two-person maximum; three-person if you are all family. Booked in 30-minute slots, 08:00 to 21:00.
Turndown ritual — every evening
If you opt in at check-in, our turndown service leaves a single hand-set letterpress card on the pillow, printed that morning at Druckerei Höhne (Kreuzberg). The text is a different short quote each night: Knuth, Diffie, Lamport, Le Guin, Mary Oliver, Cliff Stoll, sometimes the night porter. You may keep them. Some guests collect.
Morning ritual — the Halbe Stunde
A staff-led half-hour walk around the block at 07:30, every weekday. Coffee on departure, a small Brötchen on return. No agenda; no chat unless you want one. Meet in the lobby.
Partner experiences (off property)
We can arrange and book the following on your behalf. Most of these are not Hacker Hotel things — they are Berlin things — but we are quite good at the arranging part.
- Private after-hours tour of the Computerspielemuseum (Karl-Marx-Allee), led by curator Dr. Andreas Lange. Tuesdays and Thursdays, by request, €25/person plus museum entry. Eight guests max.
- Member meet-up access to c-base (Rungestraße), Berlin's beloved subterranean spaceship — Tuesdays after 19:00. Always free. Bring an open mind and a hand for shaking.
- Tempelhofer Feld guided field walk, Saturday mornings, May–September, with biologist Dr. Julia Krenz. Two hours, the history of the airfield as a piece of accidental wilderness. €30 per person.
- Behind-the-scenes of the Bundesdruckerei's Museum für Druckkunst — coordinated through their press office; usually two weeks' notice. €0 (their generosity); donation appreciated.
- East Side print walk with the printer behind our turndown cards, Frieda Höhne. A two-hour walk along the East Side Gallery with a stop at her shop for a hand-set print to take home. €60 per person; Saturdays only.
- A jazz reservation at A-Trane (Charlottenburg), which we will simply make for you because it is a perfectly good thing to do on a Tuesday.
A short note: we accept tips for the concierge desk gladly and pool them weekly among the team that does the arranging.