Heilandskirche at the Port of Sacrow

Beautiful excursion destination on the Havel, accessible by bike or ferry from both Berlin and Potsdam.

This extraordinary church was built in 1844. The construction of the Berlin Wall led to almost complete destruction in the following decades. Since its restoration in 1990, it has again been a venue for worship, concerts and weddings. On Christmas Eve 1989 the first service was held for 30 years. Since 1990 the church is under the protection of UNESCO.
Distance to the bike path: 1.8 km and ferry ride
Opening hours in March to April and September to October Tuesdays to
Sundays from 10 to 15.30; from May to August Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 4pm.

South of the Brandenburg village of Sacrow, on the banks of the Havel, stands the Church of the Savior at the Port of Sacrow, which protrudes into the river on a headland. The unusual church due to its location and style, simply called the “Saviour's Church”, was built in 1844 as a sacred building in the Italian style with a free-standing campanile (bell tower) based on drawings designed by the “Romantic on the Throne” Friedrich Wilhelm IV. The “architect of the king” Ludwig Persius was commissioned to plan the construction.

The church is located around one hundred meters below the small Sacrower Castle and is part of its castle park, which the garden artist Peter Joseph Lenné also extensively redesigned in the 1840s. The Heilandskirche and castle were restored after the fall of the Wall in the 1990s and are part of the Potsdam Havel landscape, which stretches from the Peacock Island to Werder and, with its castles and gardens as an ensemble, has been protected as a world cultural heritage site by UNESCO since 1990. The village of Sacrow, picturesquely nestled between Fontane's “cultural stream” Havel, which opens up to the Jungfernsee, the Sacrower See and forests, has been part of Potsdam in the southwest since 1939. The “Fuchsberge” separate it from Kladow, a district of Berlin-Spandau, around three kilometers northeast.

Since the restoration, the church has again been a place for church services, concerts and church weddings.

Source: This text is based on the article “Church of the Savior at the Port of Sacrow” from the free encyclopedia Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License. A list of authors is available on Wikipedia.