“I had not given up the dream to become a fashion or costume designer and my wonderful parents made it again possible for me to go to the Textil Und Modeschule der Reichshauptstadt Berlin, a college for fashion design and pattern-making.
The only other school like this was in Munich. So, all of a sudden I got to know a totally different breed of girls, rich ones. They came from all over Germany and many of them bragged about their families. I would have been looked down at, so I never talked about my working class background. It bothered me in the beginning, but I had more talent than most of them! That made me feel good. Besides this, I had the best time of my life.
The war was going on already for two years and it got worse. Bombing started almost day and night. One room in our basement was a bomb shelter and we spent many hours there, listening to the airplanes and shooting of our anti aircraft artillery, and hoping the sound of falling bombs didn’t come too close to us.
Then came the time fashion was not important anymore and after one and a half years of studies, the college had to close and we all went to work in factories. Everything to “win the war!” I got a job in a construction office where I copied designs of little parts for airplanes. In the Spring of 1944, the company was destroyed by bombs and relocated 4 hours by train to the east of Berlin, and all of us employees had to move there too.”
From Ursula’s autobiography, Leaving Berlin.
Ursula Grimm 