History
Franz Carl Achard (1753-1821)
Berlin was central to the history of sugar. It was here that, in 1747, chemist Andreas Sigismund Marggraf discovered cultivate beet and to sugar in beet. His pupil Franz Carl Achard later carried out experiments in Berlin-Kaulsdorf to extract sugar from beet crops. As a result, he was able to present the King of Prussia with the first sugar produced from beet in 1799. 68 years later, the "Verein der Rübenzuckerindustrie" (Association for the Sugar Beet Industry) opened a laboratory on Alexandrinenstraße as part of the German Customs Union, the oldest trade association in Germany.
In 1904, the association’s "Institut für Zuckerindustrie" (Sugar Industry Institute) moved into its own building on Amrumer Straße, where it set up a museum. The Sugar Museum has documented the extraordinary history of this everyday food item ever since and in 1995 became part of the Stiftung Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin.