Photos of the Beelitz Heilstätten, the abandoned hospital near Berlin

Beelitz Heilstaetten was an abandoned hospital near Berlin. It was probably one of best known abandoned places and Germany and thus popular among urban explorers. Please mind my words: Beelitz Heilstaetten was one of the most popular lost places because it is not more. Many buildings were revitalized and turned into homes. Luckily, I visited the abandoned hospital a few times before and could take some photos of the historical hospital.

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Know before you go to Beelitz Heilstaetten

Where are the Beelitz Heilstaetten?

Beelitz Heilstaetten is actually a district of a town named Beelitz in Brandenburg, Germany. It's about an hour by car and train south-east from Berlin.

 

Why is Beelitz Heilstaetten famous?

Beelitz Heilstaetten is famous because of historical personalities who were treated there like Adolf Hitler after he was wounded in World War I and Erich Honecker, who suffered from lung cancer, and spent his last days in Beelitz Heilstaetten.

But more importantly, Beelitz Heilstaetten was also a popular filming location. The most pouplar movies filmed partially in Beelitz are:

  • Valkyrie (2011) starring Tom Cruise
  • A cure for Wellness (2015)
  • The Netflix Series 1899 (2022)

During my visits to Beelitz, I could explore one of these abandoned filming locations. Head to my blog post about the filming location of a Cure for Wellness.

There's also a german movie called Heilstaetten, which is set at Beelitz, but was filmed at another abandoned hospital near Berlin. You can ready more about this location in my blog post about the abandoned Heilstaette at Grabowsee.

Why was the hospital abandoned?

After the end of World War II, the Soviets occupied parts of the heavily damaged area and used it as a hospital. Right after the German unification, the Soviets and the Red Army abandoned former east Germany and Beelitz Heilstaetten were left to decay.

Photos of the abandoned hospital

The hospital consisted of about 60 buildings. Many of them were huge, long, three-floor buildings. So Inside of these I found dozens of huge hallways with half open doors, broken windows and sometimes difficult light to photograph.

Huge Hallway at Beelitz Heilstaetten

Huge Hallway at Beelitz Heilstaetten

There's not much left of the furnishing. Occasionally you'd find a room that contained a few relicts like in this auditorium. It was allegedly used as a classroom for educating and training the staff at Beelitz Heilstaetten.

Abandoned Auditorium at Beelitz

What I found rather cool is the paint that was peeling off the walls like in this rather dark corner that I discovered in one of the buildings, the famous Whitney Houston house. But don't be mislead. Whitney Houston never performed here. The house got its name from an art performance dedicated to the famous Singer.

Paint peeling off the walls

Paint peeling off the walls

Though exploring such a huge abandoned place is fascinating and sometimes eerie, it's also dangerous like this window frame illustrates. It could fall off any time. So as a rule of thumb, when you enter a lost place: Always look up if there's anything that could come down.

Always look up if there's anything that could come down before entering an abandoned place

Always look up if there's anything that could come down before entering an abandoned place

Another recommendation is to bring a flashlight. Back then, when I explored Beelitz, I used two flashlights from Olight. But I recently switched to a more powerful 12.000 lumens flashlight from Wuben. If you're curious, please check my review of the Wuben X1 flashlight. But on the other hand, you may not need a flashlight for taking photos in a lost place, because the darkness and harsh shadows can be used to compose interesting photos.

Light and shadows at Beelitz Heilstaetten

The next photo is from the abandoned filming location of the movie A Cure for Wellness. Parts of a hospital building were superficially renovated to look good in the movie. But if you'd open a door you'd see the decaying rooms behind them (PS: Sorry!). You'll find more photos of this part of Beelitz Heilstaetten in a dedicated blog post about the abandoned filming location of A Cure for Wellness

Superficially renovated part of Beelitz Heilstaetten

As I've mentioned, a large part of Beelitz Heilstaetten was revitalized. But a few of the dacaying buildings are still there and you can even visit them. Among them is one of the most impressive buildings: there's an entire forrest growing on top of it! To learn how you can see this building, please check my blog post about the Beelitz Heilstaetten canopy walk.

Experience this rooftop forrest from the Beelitz Heilstaetten canopy walk

Is Beelitz Heilstaetten worth visiting?

Yes, it's definitely worth visiting Beelitz Heilstaetten. Though many of the decaying buildings are no more, you can still get a feeling about how urban exploration felt in Beelitz when I visited this well known lost place. Either from the canopy walk or by booking one of the short and guided tours through the remains of the historically interesting, abandoned, hospital near Berlin.

Chris Feichtner

In 2012, I ditched my cumbersome DSLR in favor of an iPhone to document my travels.

https://nocamerabag.com
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