Handyman in Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf – our office is in the borough

Around Kurfürstendamm, Savignyplatz and Lietzensee you’ll find large Gründerzeit and Art Nouveau buildings: four- and five-room flats, the typical Berlin corner room (Berliner Zimmer), ceilings well over three metres, stucco and parquet. Wilmersdorf was badly hit in the Second World War, so plenty of 1950s and 1960s buildings stand between the old ones – including here in the Güntzelkiez. Grunewald and Westend are mostly detached villas with gardens.

A big Altbau flat takes more work than its floor area suggests. High ceilings mean a platform or mobile scaffold, stucco has to be masked carefully, and old plaster under woodchip wallpaper sometimes comes away. Wiring was usually renewed room by room, so old and new cables sit side by side. Before we add a socket or hang a light from a ceiling rose, we check what’s actually in the wall.

Many of these flats are heated by their own gas boiler (Gasetagenheizung). Radiators, valves and thermostatic heads are ours; the boiler itself belongs with a firm registered for gas work, and we’ll say so. The post-war buildings have smaller rooms and lighter walls – there it’s more often bathroom fittings, a new kitchen, or freshening up a flat before handing it back to the landlord.

Parking around Kurfürstendamm is scarce and paid. For a move or a large delivery we can apply for a temporary no-parking zone (Halteverbotszone) from the borough’s traffic authority; the signs have to go up a few days ahead. If you’d rather talk things through in person, bring photos or the floor plan to the office – Berliner Straße U-Bahn station is about 250 metres away, Güntzelstraße just under 500 metres.

We start at Landhausstraße 31, inside the borough. Savignyplatz is about 2 km in a straight line, Charlottenburg town hall about 3.5 km. Grunewald and Westend lie further west, on the far side of the A100 city motorway. Travel within Berlin is included in the fixed price, so a job in the Güntzelkiez and one at the edge of Grunewald are quoted on the same principle.