Burghausen in Upper Bavaria

17 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  7 minutes

© Rolf Kranz/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Rolf Kranz/cc-by-sa-4.0

Burghausen is the largest town in the Altötting district of Upper Bavaria in Germany. It is situated on the Salzach river, near the border with Austria. Burghausen Castle rests along a ridgeline, and is the longest castle in the world (1,043 m).   read more…

Eichstätt in Upper Bavaria

9 April 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  8 minutes

Market Square -wuppertaler/cc-© by-sa-4.0

Market Square -wuppertaler/cc-© by-sa-4.0

Eichstätt is a town in the federal state of Bavaria, Germany, and capital of the district of Eichstätt. It is located on the Altmühl river and has a population of around 13,000. Eichstätt is also the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Eichstätt. Eichstätt lies on both sides of the river Altmühl in the district of Eichstätt of the Upper Bavaria region of Bavaria, in the heart of Altmühl Valley Nature Park.   read more…

Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism

27 January 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions Reading Time:  4 minutes

© flickr.com - Fred Romero/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – Fred Romero/cc-by-2.0

The NS-Dokumentationszentrum is a museum in the Maxvorstadt area of Munich, Germany, which focuses on the history and consequences of the Nazi regime and the role of Munich as Hauptstadt der Bewegung (′capital of the movement′).   read more…

Weihenstephan in Bavaria

26 December 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  5 minutes

© Wolfgang Rieger/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Wolfgang Rieger/cc-by-sa-3.0

Weihenstephan is a part of Freising north of Munich, Germany. It is located on the Weihenstephan Hill, named after the Weihenstephan Abbey, in the west of the city. Freising is the oldest town between Regensburg and Bolzano, and is located on the Isar river in Upper Bavaria, near the Munich International Airport. The city is built on and around two prominent hills: the Cathedral Hill with the former Bishop’s Residence and Freising Cathedral, and Weihenstephan Hill with the former Weihenstephan Abbey, containing the oldest working brewery in the world. It was also the location of the first recorded tornado in Europe. The city is 448 meters above sea level.   read more…

Zugspitze cable car, an aerial tramway in Bavaria

1 August 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month Reading Time:  8 minutes

The new Zugspitze station © Friedrich-Karl Mohr/cc-by-sa-3.0-de

The new Zugspitze station © Friedrich-Karl Mohr/cc-by-sa-3.0-de

The Seilbahn Zugspitze is an aerial tramway running from the Eibsee Lake to the top of Zugspitze in Bavaria, Germany. It currently holds the world record for the longest freespan in a cable car at 3,213 metres (10,541 ft) as well as the tallest lattice steel aerial tramway support tower in the world at 127 metres (417 ft). Construction of the system began in 2015 and it opened on 22 December 2017.   read more…

Brewer’s Star

25 April 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Living, Working, Building Reading Time:  7 minutes

Stammhauses der Riegeler Brauerei © Andreas Schwarzkopf/cc-by-sa-3.0

Stammhauses der Riegeler Brauerei © Andreas Schwarzkopf/cc-by-sa-3.0

The brewer’s star (also: beer star, beer pointer, brew star, in the Upper Palatinate also Bierzoigl and Zoiglstern) is a six-pointed star (hexagram) that is used as a guild sign for brewers and maltsters. The brewer’s star is also the symbol for the issuing office of the house drink of a brewery, which is therefore also called “star” or “stars”. The six-pointed Zoigl star, which is formed from two interlocking equilateral triangles, symbolizes the three elements involved in brewing, fire, water and air, and on the other hand the ingredients water, malt and hops that were common in the late Middle Ages. In the house book of the Mendelschen Zwölfbrüderstiftung from 1425, a brewer named Hertel is shown at a brew kettle with a brewer’s star. There are (so far) various hypotheses about the origin of the brewer’s star.   read more…

House of Art in Munich

21 January 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions Reading Time:  10 minutes

© Rufus46/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Rufus46/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Haus der Kunst (House of Art) is a non-collecting modern and contemporary art museum in Munich, Germany. It is located at Prinzregentenstraße 1 at the southern edge of the Englischer Garten, Munich’s largest park. Despite being a non-collecting institution, Haus der Kunst has over the years received numerous works of art. In 2011, Haus der Kunst forged a partnership with the private Goetz Collection to co-curate exhibits of video art. By 2013, it was one of the beneficiaries – along with the Bavarian State Museums and the Neues Museum in Nuremberg – when Ingvild Goetz donated her collection of video art to the state of Bavaria and made the collection as a whole, which includes almost 5,000 works, available on permanent loan. In 2017, Jewish artist Mel Bochner donated his piece Joys of Yiddish (2012-15) to Haus der Kunst. Comprising a list of Yiddish words in yellow on black, it traverses the museum’s façade as a reminder of the tragic disappearance of the language from German culture.   read more…

Margravial Opera House Bayreuth

25 November 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Opera Houses, Theaters, Libraries, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  9 minutes

Stage © Pierre Schoberth/cc-by-sa-3.0

Stage © Pierre Schoberth/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Margravial Opera House (German: Markgräfliches Opernhaus) is a Baroque opera house in the town of Bayreuth, Germany, built between 1745 and 1750. It is one of Europe’s few surviving theatres of the period and has been extensively restored. On 30 June 2012, the opera house was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List. It was built according to plans designed by the French architect Joseph Saint-Pierre (ca. 1709 – 1754), court builder of the Hohenzollern margrave Frederick of Brandenburg-Bayreuth and his wife Princess Wilhelmine of Prussia. It was inaugurated on the occasion of the marriage of their daughter Elisabeth Fredericka Sophie with Duke Charles Eugene of Württemberg.   read more…

Würzburg Residence

20 September 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  11 minutes

Kaisersaal © Andreas Faessler/cc-by-sa-4.0

Kaisersaal © Andreas Faessler/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Würzburg Residence (German: Würzburger Residenz) is a palace in Würzburg, Germany. Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt and Maximilian von Welsch, representatives of the Austrian/South German Baroque style, were involved in the construction, as well as Robert de Cotte and Germain Boffrand, who were followers of the French Style. Balthasar Neumann, court architect of the Bishop of Würzburg, was the principal architect of the Residence, which was commissioned by the Prince-Bishop of Würzburg Johann Philipp Franz von Schönborn and his brother Friedrich Carl von Schönborn in 1720, and completed in 1744. The Venetian painter Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, assisted by his son, Domenico, painted frescoes in the building. Interiors considered masterworks of Baroque/Rococo or Neoclassical architecture and art include the grand staircase, the chapel, and the Imperial Hall. The building was reportedly called the “largest parsonage in Europe” by Napoleon. It was heavily damaged by Allied bombing during World War II, and restoration has been in progress since 1945.   read more…

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