It started badly. I arrived in Berlin late. My hotel, which had claimed to be central, turned out to be an unappealing former Eastern bloc block stuck out on a ring road. And the carpet in my room had cigarette burns.

The evening ahead looked grim. But then came the call from Rik Nys, David Chipperfield’s chief fixer. Dinner had been delayed, but they were about to start. Would I care to join them? I was in the taxi before he’d put the phone down. No-one can accuse Chipperfield of underplaying the completion of his Neues Museum project. He and his team had been based in Berlin for nearly a week, holding a dinner every night for an eclectic range of people – from the great and good of Berlin to the world’s press and his own family.

That night’s venue was in a wonderfully eccentric location – a huge room beneath the corner dome of Berlin’s former head post office. David remembered all the great dinners the project had engendered over the years, and wondered how to continue them. Ah - he brightened - they were just starting the new Museum island entrance building. That could yield some dinners. And he needs them, because nobody works harder at explaining his buildings. Next day, we assembled for a tour of the Neues Museum. No press packs, no DVDs of images, none of the usual paraphernalia of a launch. Instead, David was our personal guide to every room in the building, only handing over to his colleagues when his voice threatened to give out. He was doing this twice a day, every day. Is there anyone who doesn’t find the Neues Museum subtle, sophisticated, challenging and brilliant? I’m not about to break the consensus – it is all those things and more.

Regular readers should turn to the RIBA Journal of July 2008, where we previewed the project in our special Chipperfield issue. The truth is that he and conservation specialist Julian Harrap have made this a far more interesting building than it ever was originally. The way the building wears its marks of damage and decay, the way the new insertions sit against the pockmarked fabric, the use of rough brick for rebuilt sections, the way every room asked different questions and has received different answers, the obsessive attention to detail. I don’t often say this, but the Neues Museum is an architectural masterclass. Too soon, I was on the double-decker train back out to Schonefeld Airport. I didn’t get to see much of my hotel, thank goodness. Though it saved itself by putting on a magnificent breakfast.

Architecture and food – they’ve always gone together.