Urban Exploration: Abandoned Kodak Factory in Köpenick

 On the 03-01-2014 my brother and me decided to visit the old Kodak factory in Köpenick. The factory was built in 1923 and bought by Kodak 4 years later. The main products were black and white and X-ray films. In 1941 the Nazi Germany commandeered it. 51 years later in 1992 it was given back to the Kodak company. The development of digital photography and the by failures marked administration led to the close down of the factory.
The whole plot consists of 3 areas: the abandoned buidlings, new built apartments along the Müggelspree and a small factory still producing X-ray film supplies.
To get there we went to the S-Bahn station Berlin-Köpenick.

From there we walked by foot towards the park Bellevue. On the other side of the street we could see the huge area. There were like massive brickstone walls surrounding the whole area but all the doors were wide opened. You could just walk in. The atmosphere was a little weird because there were alot of persons on the streets and a playground nearby and it was pretty clear what we were planning to do.
On our left side there were like wide factory halls and on our right a high building which looked pretty damaged. We decided to go there first. Also here the door wasn't a problem at all it was just missing. We found ourselves in a staircase. The building had something like 2 areas on each floor: One laboratory and one administrative area, which were seperated by the staircase. The atmosphere was pretty amazing. Compared to all the other abandoned buildings I've seen so far this one was in such a good shape! Only some graffitis and even some glass installations were not broken! The lab area was characterized by huge lab benches, valves, pipes, tanks, boilers, ventilation systems and humid documents.  Another great thing were yellowish light filters which partially covered most of the windows in the lab areas.

Soundless walking was impossbile, as usual for a lab, there were alot of glass things. And most of them were cracked on the floor. We made like a crunching sound all the time we moved.

After exploring the first floor we decided to go on wih the cellar because it already got a little dark outside. Going down the stairs we were scared as hell. Some great people put a stuffed animal in the shape of a bear in the dark staircase. Disappointingly the cellar was flodded and we only wear sneakers. So we had to continue exploring upstairs.

Again we found alot of laboratories, bathrooms and offices. One room was prepared as a home for a homeless person. He had like a small kitchen and a sleeping bag and alot of shoes. But apparently he wasn't home. Taking photos in one room we heard steps and the sounds of a walkie-talkie all of a sudden. That scared the hell out of us because the area is being observed by a security agency. But luckily the sounds got more and more silent after 10 min. We planned to stay away from the windows.

On the sixth floor we found huge room above the lab areas with alot of air filters and stuff. The room had a awesome atmosphere because of its really low ceiling. After crossing the room we realized that he ended directly on the roof. And we had such a good luck with the sky, the clouds in the horizon looked awesome. After sunset we left the roof and the area quickly.

At all, this exploration was the best one so far. We didn't meet people at all, the atmosphere was both scary and exciting. I definetly plan on going there again because in the end we just saw this one building from many!

Urbex: Güterbahnhof Pankow

On the 02-01-2014 we explored the abandoned freight yard in Pankow. We had to get off at S-Bahn station Pankow-Heinersdorf, where my brother and me met some friends for exploration. We just went back over the bridge and took the small path leading towards some garden plots. Just next to this we could see the estimated area, closed down with alot of fences and a huge iron door. The door was locked, but apparently nearly all of the fences were broken down. So we could just hop over and there we were. 



Right infront of us there was this huge round building. We took a path of cobblestones, which definetly formed a track bed in the past. The round building had a platform to move trains in a circular way into different tracks, which all surrounded the platform in the middle like a star. The building itself was huge, but all the interesting things like the tracks were covered with heavy wood pieces. Also there was no interior at all, everything besides some hooks and metal things seemed to be removed once.





We continued exploring the area in the North. We walked past alot of garages, which were all locked. The whole way was covered with tree branches, it was a little hard to get through it. The nature took back what was its years ago. 





In one garage, which was almost completly broken down, we found an old car full of rust and graffiti tags. On our right side there was a long wall with concrete installations, which definetly formed some sort of tracks in the past. 



 

Finally we reached another part of the area, a huge building in the shape of a semi circle surrounding another railway turntable. Probably these buildings were some kind of storage or repair places for trains. The building had spaces under the tracks, probably for inspection of the stored machines. 





Next to this building there were some smaller ones. But unfortunatly none of them was enterable.



At all this was a nice area, but it's kind of overpopulated. You see alot of other explorers and graffiti sprayers. Also almost everything was destroyed and so the whole area seemed a little alienated. But it's definetly worth a visit.