Kellertor

The Kellertor stands in Potsdam, marking the eastern water entrance to the city. It was one of ten historic city gates, built alongside the remnants of the 1722 town wall in Große Fischerstraße and the start of the city canal. The gate replaced a wooden structure in 1788 under King Friedrich Wilhelm II, who transformed it into a picturesque ensemble with a bridge and canal. The late-classical guardhouse with its late-baroque decoration was added shortly after his death, likely designed by Georg Christian Unger. The imposing Kellertorwache was meant to be seen from the bend of the main road near the former Berliner Brücke, its ten columns framing the view.

The guardhouse once housed two grenadiers and a royal tax officer who collected duties on goods arriving by water. After the Stein-Hardenberg reforms abolished these taxes, the gates were used until 1909 to levy milling and slaughter taxes. Later, the site served as a water-based goods station, with the gatekeeper’s house rented to a forwarding company. During the Second World War, Soviet artillery struck the Kellertor, and the surviving portico was demolished around 1960 on the city’s orders.

In 2015, the city sold the site to a private owner with strict conditions to reconstruct the building true to its original form. Completed in 2017, it now serves as a private home. Behind the guardhouse, on the Havel side near the former municipal harbour at the city canal junction, a public riverside park has been created.