It’s summertime again and like every year since 2006, >Wedding Dress #4< is coming to Berlin on July 4th and 5th. From 11am until midnight the international fashion designers of Wedding Dress #4 will host their most recent collections and their best of last season throughout various showrooms and on a catwalk in 500+ meter length. Get ready for a spectacular line-up featuring Marcel Ostertag, Comtesse de la Haye, Andrea Klüsener, Tata Christiane, Von Bardonitz, Aschön, Seelenkleid and the list goes on and on...The streetstyle-fashion show “Sunday’s  Best” in Brunnenstasse 65 is a must see event for all passersby looking to be inspired.  Like every year street-fashion photographer Darryl Natale will pick out the top 20 best dressed from the crowd and bring them right up to the catwalk. Still not satisfied? That can easily be arranged, since the live musical accompaniment, outdoor shopping and food stands will make sure you won’t worry about how to appease your voguish or culinary hunger.

Don’t you love the smell of beautiful fashion in the morning? If so, then the 5th >Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week< in Berlin is the place to be. Starting on July 1st, the opening defilé features creations of Boss Oranges, Custo Barcelona and Escada (at Bebelplatz) and the fashion week’s highlight will be the innovative and exciting >Bread & Butter< – Fashion Fair, situated in former Tempelhof Airport. The last but not least mentionable event is the >Premium< exhibition in Luckenwalderstr. 4-6 since it adds a refreshing touch to the conventional notion of fashion. While these are reserved for professionals only, the „Showroom Meile 9“ stretching from Unter den Linden until Alexanderplatz is accessible to the general public and includes conferences, exhibitions and retro Fashion and Design projects. For those interested in “green fashion” the exhibition of >thekey.to< (Imperial Post Office – Neukölln) will definitely be worth your while. Are your fashion senses tingling yet? (the fotos show Michael Sontag's fashion).

The 19th interdisciplinary Festival Rencontres Internationales opening on June 30th at the <Haus der Kulturen der Welt< will show an elaborate program consisting of film, video and media art. More than 150 contributions from Germany, France, Spain and 50 other nations will present their visionary discoveries that are harnessed between cinema and contemporary art. New forms of films, experimental videos and documentaries, like the one of visual artist and Velasquez-Prize winner Antoni Muntadas, will all be part of the festive occasion. Numerous film screenings, video-parcours and the insightful round table discussions set up the three main parts of the Festival Rencontres Internationales hosted in Berlin’s Haus der Kulturen der Welt. The yearly event is organized by the City of Berlin and Paris as well as the Bureau for French-German Cultural Cooperation and was also established in Madrid two years ago. The FRI hosts a great amount of motion pictures that were shown at the Film Festival de Cannes and Venice, thus making it a must-see event for every film buff.

The life of strangers and the unique stories they tell always piqued the incurable curiosity of 37 year-old artist >Frank Rothe<. “Just another day in the life of John or Jane Doe” is what intrigues Rothe the most. The focus of his photography is catching a glimpse of inconspicuous people during trivial activities like cooking or watching TV. But what happens when a gun or a weapon of any sort is added to the picture? Rothe’s eclectic portraits in his “German Gun” series show normal people with possessions that “disturb the peace”. He cleverly accentuates how weapons function as power symbols that inevitably cause a shift in relationships. The key element of Rothe’s photography is irritation, mainly by first steering the viewers’ eye on the fazing objects and then making them aware of the portrayed facial expressions. >Pixel Grain Gallery< (Rosenstrasse 16/17), will display Rothe’s exceptional “German Gun”’ series until July 1st.

The one of a kind “Peep-Shopping Night” in the >Galleries Lafayette< (Friedrichstrasse 76-78) has established a reputation for glamorous and stylish eroticism. On June 26th starting at 11pm, the French store will host several provocative events that are bound to make every voyeur’s heart skip a beat. The “Peep-Shopping Night” offers readings of erotic short-stories, a round of strip-poker and a T-shirt contest across 3 different areas. DJs “Gloria Viagra” and “Miss Barbie Breakout” amongst many others will provide mood-setting music while the burlesque-dance performances will cater for the visual stimulant. Even a small wedding chapel for visitors “in heat” is accounted for and limited lingerie collections and accessories will be for sale for both men and women. So every open-minded adult is invited to take a “peep” and live it up a little in Berlin’s Galleries Lafayette.

On June 27th at 8 pm, Weltklang – Nacht der Poesie will unfold its magical debut where poems will be read in their own languages without the intrusion of spoken translation. Linguistic dexterity and the power of words, Weltklang presents the full range of poetic production on stage. As the opening event of the >Poetry Festival< in Berlin, it will use voice, language and sound as the tools for skilled artists to fashion the poetry. This night features eight well-articulated international poets of all ages, with each and every one of them thriving in poetic liberty and expressing individual creativity. Their special trademark is to combine poetry with other forms of art such as music and dance. Gifted with keen sensitivity, many of them add yet another dimension to their mesmerizing performance. Is it a coincidence that Adolf Endler, a German participant is regarded as one of the wildest and most sensuous artists? This is very doubtful, since his provocative poetry is always combinded with political commitment. The project Weltklang was pioneered by the Literaturwerkstatt Berlin and took place ten times so far. This year’s venue will be the >Academy of the Arts< in Berlin’s Hanseatenweg.

Summer is back in Berlin too! Sun, hot weather, colours, drinks on the beach... Sunday the 21st Berlin's >Fête de la Musique< is gonna celebrate the beginning of summer with lots and lots of live concerts on around 80 stages throughout the city. All music genres are well represented, including world music and jazz, and all performances are free. The whole city will take part in a colourful welcome to the summer - together with other 60 european cities and more than 340 other countries all over the world, where the Fête de la Musique will take place on the same day. (copyright: Henrike Mayer / Alexander Laljak)

>Levi's BERLIN Unbuttoned< has reached Berlin. After a long journey through Zurich, Wien, Hamburg, and many other cities “501 unbuttoned minutes of progressive music and style” is throwing a party just for you on 2nd July at >Astra Kulturhaus< in Revaler strasse 99. The event is a musical melting pot featuring a breathtaking line-up that opens with Garage-Rock and Uk-pop but then explodes with Electro, Hip-hop and House. Subways, Esser, Boys Noize, Crookers, Amandablank and Shirkhan will all be there for the sole puprose to rock your socks off...There is no way around it, so come and celebrate the historical 501 Levi's - the one and only pair of jeans that is never going to die.

Don't forget to tell us the funniest memory you have of your Levi's...the two most original stories will be rewarded with a free-ticket for an amazing long-lasting night. Send your email at contact@stylesreportberlin.com

>Transient Spaces – The Tourist Syndrome< is an interdisciplinary project on the symmetries and asymmetries between contemporary tourism and migration that offers workshops, seminars, conferences and art exhibitions in Italy, Lithuania, Romania and Germany. In order to further expand the program’s outreach, its newly established Summer Camp invites artists, architects, cultural producers, theorists, and academics to an interdisciplinary dialogue and exchange on new forms of mobility. The eight-day camp runs from September 3rd-11th 2009 in Palanga (Lithuania) in a renowned seaside resort on the Baltic Sea coast, and will have a special focus on the relationship between tourism and migration. It is structured as a collective brain storming session on the topics of tourism and migration and will offer a diverse programme of convivial and informal moments, drawing from the tradition of Socialist plein air symposia, combining work (artistic and intellectual production) and leisure. The open call application deadline is June 30th and a maximum of fifty participants can be selected. Check out www.transientspaces.org for further detail on the application procedure.

The AANDO FINE ART exhibition “SubstractConstruct” is solely dedicated to the impressive work of Berlin’s own >Hansjörg Schneider<. The designer’s unique selling-point is the skilful use of paper to convey visions of architecture. Schneider works with shadows and leaves room for the viewer’s creative imaginations thus revealing his talent for astonishing dimensionality. The key ingredients in all of his paper-based reinventions are the accentuation of empty spaces and reducing buildings to their minimalistic trestles and frames. Schneider’s notion of undraped aesthetic, exemplified by cutting out windows with exact precision, is well synchronized with the dictum of modern architecture “less is more”. He also participated in individual and collaborative exhibitions across Europe and has a considerable artistic repertoire that was showcased in Berlin’s copperplate engraving museum. The >AANDO FINE ART< “SubstractConstruct” exhibition is situated in Tucholskystrasse 35/Auguststrasse and will display Schneider’s fascinating art until July 11th.