The story of this place
Built in 1917 as the last palace of the Hohenzollerns, Cecilienhof looks like an English country manor dropped into a Potsdam park. From 17 July to 2 August 1945 it hosted the Potsdam Conference, where Harry Truman, Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill — replaced mid-conference by Clement Attlee — decided the fate of defeated Germany. Soviet gardeners planted a giant red star of geraniums in the courtyard, still replanted today. It was here, during a break, that Truman hinted to Stalin about a 'weapon of unusual destructive force' — the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima four days later. The round oak conference table survives in place.