The ASTOR Film Lounge on Kurfürstendamm is dark for 18 months

The house that invented the German premium cinema format has closed. Operations ceased on 31 May, and berlin.de gives the closure as 18 months of extensive construction. entwicklungsstadt.de, reporting in April, put the minimum at the same figure. That puts a return in late 2027 at the earliest.

The reason sits in the building rather than the cinema. Parts of the structure at Kurfürstendamm 225 need refurbishment. The 1950s auditorium is not being redesigned: projectors, seating technology and the other movable parts were taken out and stored so construction dust cannot reach them.

What this leaves on the Kurfürstendamm

Hans-Joachim Flebbe took over a CinemaxX here at the end of 2008, pulled out most of the seating and put 231 leather armchairs back in fourteen rows. Every other ASTOR followed from this room. It is also the smallest picture of any premium house in the country, 2K onto a 13.2-metre screen, which was always the trade: you paid for the room and the service rather than the resolution.

The room itself is the reason the closure matters. Gerhard Fritsche built the shell-shaped auditorium in 1952 and it has been listed since. Flebbe kept it and changed what happened inside it: a doorman, a free cloakroom, a welcome drink, and someone bringing the wine to your row during the film.

entwicklungsstadt.de also reports that parts of the basement are to be used by the cinema in future, so the house is not simply being put back as it was.

What is left in Berlin

Berlin keeps its other premium house. The Zoo Palast, the city's premiere cinema from 1957 and the Berlinale competition venue until 1999, reopened in 2013 after a restoration that took over two years, and its Kino 1 is the largest auditorium in regular use in the city.

We no longer list the ASTOR Film Lounge as an operating cinema. It comes back when it reopens, not before.