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Churches & monasteries
Kloster Lehnin
Lehnin Abbey (Kloster Lehnin) in Brandenburg is one of the most important brick monasteries in the Mark Brandenburg region, founded in 1180. The red brick church of St. Marien, the gate chapel and the old monastery buildings sit in a quiet…
Churches & monasteries
Rehburg-Loccum
Loccum Abbey (Kloster Loccum) in Rehburg-Loccum, near Lake Steinhude west of Hanover, is one of the best-preserved Cistercian monasteries north of the Alps. Behind its old enclosure wall you will find a serene late-Romanesque church, a pea…
Churches & monasteries
Lorsch
Lorsch Abbey (Kloster Lorsch) in southern Hesse is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the most important relics of the Carolingian era in Germany. The once-powerful imperial abbey survives mainly through its famous Königshalle, a gate…
Churches & monasteries
Neuzelle
Neuzelle Abbey in eastern Brandenburg is one of the few fully preserved monastery complexes in Europe, often called the "Baroque miracle on the Oder." Behind the bright yellow facade of the abbey church lies an exuberant interior of stucco…
Churches & monasteries
Ottobeuren
Ottobeuren Abbey in the Bavarian Allgäu is one of the finest Baroque monasteries in Germany, often called the "Swabian Escorial." The Benedictine community has lived here since 764, and its basilica, with three domes, frescoes and white-an…
Churches & monasteries
Ostritz
St. Marienthal Abbey (Kloster St. Marienthal) in Ostritz is described as the oldest continuously existing Cistercian nunnery in Germany. It stands on the Lusatian Neisse river right on the Polish border in Upper Lusatia, east of Dresden. T…
Palaces
Salem
Salem Abbey (Kloster und Schloss Salem) on Lake Constance is one of the most important baroque monastery complexes in southern Germany. This former imperial Cistercian abbey blends a Gothic minster with baroque state rooms, and in the 19th…
Churches & monasteries
Walkenried
Walkenried Abbey (Kloster Walkenried), on the southern edge of the Harz mountains in Lower Saxony, is one of Germany's most atmospheric Cistercian monasteries and, since 2010, part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The soaring ruins of its…
Churches & monasteries
Kelheim
Weltenburg Abbey near Kelheim sits on a bend of the Danube River, right at the entrance to the Danube Gorge, where the river squeezes between towering limestone cliffs. This Benedictine monastery is famous for three things: a breathtaking…
Churches & monasteries
Reichenau
Reichenau Island, the "Monastic Island" in Lake Constance near Konstanz, has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2000. It preserves three Romanesque churches whose origins reach back to a Benedictine abbey founded in the 8th century, s…
Museums
Köln
Kolumba is the art museum of the Archdiocese of Cologne, built by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor on top of the ruins of a late Gothic church in the heart of Cologne's old town. If you are visiting Cologne and want something quieter than the…
Churches & monasteries
Konstanz
Konstanz Minster (Konstanzer Münster) in Konstanz on Lake Constance served for more than a thousand years as the cathedral of one of the largest dioceses in the German-speaking world. Today, the Basilica of Our Lady is the landmark of the…
Museums
Bremen
The Kunsthalle Bremen is the city's leading art museum, set on the green ramparts park at the edge of Bremen's Old Town. Its collection spans six centuries, from Old Masters to French Impressionism, the pioneering painter Paula Modersohn-B…
Museums
Düsseldorf
The Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf is one of Germany's leading museums of 20th- and 21st-century art, spread across two buildings: K20 on Grabbeplatz in the Old Town, home to modern classics from Paul Klee to Jackson Pollo…
Landmarks
Baden-Baden
The Kurhaus of Baden-Baden is the grand neoclassical centerpiece of Germany's most famous spa town, on the edge of the Black Forest. Behind its white columned facade lies the legendary Casino Baden-Baden, which Marlene Dietrich called the…
Landmarks
Wiesbaden
The Kurhaus Wiesbaden is the grand spa house of Wiesbaden, the capital of Hesse, about 40 km west of Frankfurt. Opened in 1907 by Emperor Wilhelm II, the neoclassical building with its columned portico and the Latin inscription "Aquis Matt…
Historic sites & memorials
Flossenbürg
The Flossenbürg Concentration Camp Memorial (KZ-Gedenkstätte Flossenbürg) in eastern Bavaria preserves the site of one of the major Nazi concentration camps, close to the Czech border roughly halfway between Nuremberg and Prague. Around 10…
Landmarks
Leipzig
Leipzig Hauptbahnhof (Central Station) is the largest terminal station in Europe by covered floor area and one of Germany's most impressive railway buildings. A sandstone facade 298 meters wide, soaring halls and a three-level shopping mal…
Industrial heritage
Leipzig
The Leipzig Cotton Mill (Leipziger Baumwollspinnerei) in the Plagwitz district is an industrial monument that now thrives as an art district. On about ten hectares of red-brick halls, artists work in studios while galleries and workshops o…
Churches & monasteries
Limburg an der Lahn
Limburg Cathedral (Limburger Dom) in Limburg an der Lahn, Hesse, is one of Germany's most photogenic churches: seven towers and a white-and-red painted facade rise from a limestone cliff above the Lahn River. Consecrated in 1235, the Cathe…
Castles
Kassel
Löwenburg Castle in Kassel looks like a crumbling medieval fortress, but it is actually a romantic fantasy built at the end of the 18th century. Set in Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2013, this artificial ruin wa…
Landmarks
Lübeck
Lübeck Town Hall on the city's market square is one of the largest medieval town halls in Germany and a showpiece of the Brick Gothic style that defined the Baltic trading cities. From here the merchants of the "Queen of the Hanseatic Leag…
Churches & monasteries
Saarbrücken
The Ludwigskirche (Ludwig's Church) in Saarbrücken is the landmark of the Saarland's capital and one of the most important Protestant Baroque churches in Germany. Designed by architect Friedrich Joachim Stengel as the centerpiece of Ludwig…
Museums
Eisenach
The Luther House in Eisenach (Lutherhaus Eisenach) is one of the oldest surviving half-timbered houses in Thuringia and one of Europe's most important Reformation sites. According to tradition, young Martin Luther lived here as a schoolboy…