Home and "Third Places" (Heimat und „Third Places“)
Source: Ludwigsburger Innenstadt (LUIS) e.V., Ludwigsburg, Germany, [online] https://www.luis-ludwigsburg.de - Cafe - Restaurant - Bar „Blauer Engel“
I grew up in Ludwigsburg and the surrounding area - lived there for over 35 years. Ludwigsburg is a fairly young city by German standards - it was just founded in the Baroque period. The largest baroque palace in Germany is located in Ludwigsburg - which you don't really appreciate when you grow up there. I think we are shaped by the places and people we grow up in and with. Many of the "Third Places" I visit today are very similar to the places I used to like and often visited at those days: especially the cafe-restaurant-bar "Blauer Engel" - an allusion to the movie "Blauer Engel" („Blue Angel“ in English) with Marlene Dietrich - in today's building of the film academy in Ludwigsburg. “Third Places” refer to places where people spend time between their home (“First Place”) and their work (“Second Place”). They are places where we exchange ideas, have fun and build relationships.
The film academy and the „Blauer Engel" are located in a simple brick building that served as US barracks until the early 1990s. However, it is the atmosphere there, the small details and the people that make this place what it is. Whenever I visit my former home (I live now in the Spessart in Hesse), I always spend some time at the "Blauer Engel". When I look at the maple trees in its beer garden, I recognize how I've grown older together with the place - because I experienced the time when they were planted there. For me it is a feel-good place with which I associate many good memories.
-Simplicius Simplicissimus
