Lessing Theater

Lessing Theater
Map
LocationBerlin, Germany
Coordinates52°31′21″N 13°22′35″E / 52.52250°N 13.37639°E / 52.52250; 13.37639
Genre(s)Theatre
Construction
Opened1888
Demolished1945
ArchitectHermann von der Hude
Julius Hennicke
Project managerOscar Blumenthal

The Lessing Theater was a theatre in the Mitte district of Berlin, Germany. It opened in 1888 and was destroyed in April 1945 in a bombing raid; its ruins were demolished after World War II.

The construction of the theatre, for around 900,000 Mark, was especially notable since it was the first new theatre built in Berlin since the construction of the Wallner Theater in 1864; in between only renovations of old theatres and existing spaces had taken place. By order of director Oscar Blumenthal, the building, designed in a Renaissance Revival style by the architects Hermann von der Hude and Julius Hennicke, was constructed in less than a year, between October 1887 and September 1888. The theatre opened on 11 September 1888, staging Gotthold Ephraim Lessing's drama Nathan the Wise.