Cities & Culture
Goethe House Frankfurt am Main
A visit to the reconstructed Goethe House in Frankfurt reveals a lot about the life of Johann Wolfgang Goethe, as this is where he was born, grew up with his parents and penned his first works of literature.
According to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's words in his autobiography "Poetry and Truth", he was born "on the stroke of twelve" on 28 August 1749. The 17th-century house in which he was born on Grosser Hirschgraben was destroyed during the Second World War but has been faithfully restored since then. On the ground floor, visitors can explore the kitchen and Goethe's mother's reception room. The library and his father's art collection are also open to the public. The family's music room is home to a rare pyramid piano that dates back to 1745. The top floor is where Goethe's famous puppet theatre is displayed and visitors can also take a look at Johann Wolfgang's writing room, which is where he penned his first works of literature.
The Goethe House also includes a painting gallery that illustrates Goethe's relationship with art and artists. The collection ranges from works by Frankfurt painters of the late Baroque to German Romanticism and includes such important names as Johann Heinrich Füssli, Angelica Kauffmann, Jakob Philipp Hackert, the Tischbein family of painters and Caspar David Friedrich.
The Goethe Gallery can be visited in its new premises in the neighbouring German Romanticism Museum.