Famous Landmarks in Frankfurt
Bank towers rise a few streets from a medieval old town rebuilt after wartime bombing.
Frankfurt's oldest landmarks sit within a few streets of each other on the north bank of the Main, around the Altstadt: the Römer city hall, the Gothic cathedral where Holy Roman emperors were elected and crowned, and the Eschenheimer Turm, a surviving gate from the medieval wall. Most of this quarter was rebuilt after the Second World War, including a reconstruction of the old town finished only in 2018. Away from that medieval core, the nineteenth century added the neoclassical St. Paul's Church, seat of the country's first national parliament, and the Alte Oper, an opera house gutted by bombing in 1944 and reopened as a concert hall in 1981 inside its restored shell.
Römer
1405
It forms the central building of three joined houses on the Römerberg square, standing opposite the Old St. Nicholas Church, with the adjoining Haus Löwenstein housing the city's wedding rooms.
The Römer is a medieval building in Frankfurt's old town, formed from three adjoining houses that the city council bought from the Römer merchant family, together with a second building known as the Golden Swan, on 11 March 1405, converting them for use as the city hall. It has held that function for more than six hundred years and remains in use today, including as a civil registration office, even though it is not run as a museum. The neighbouring old town quarter has since been redeveloped, with several historical reconstructions, into the 2010s.
- The council bought it as part of a package deal that included a second building known as the Golden Swan.
- Weddings are still registered here today, in the adjoining Haus Löwenstein, even though the building is not run as a museum.
Photo: Thomas Wolf, www.foto-tw.de (CC BY-SA 3.0 de)
Frankfurt Cathedral
1239–1550 · Madern Gerthener
As the largest religious building in the city, its Gothic profile dominates the historic centre; despite being commonly called a cathedral, it has never held that official rank, having served instead as the empire's election and coronation church.
Frankfurt Cathedral is a Roman Catholic Gothic church dedicated to Saint Bartholomew, its construction spanning the thirteenth to the sixteenth century, with Madern Gerthener among the architects who worked on it. Although its English name suggests otherwise, it has never held the rank of a true cathedral with a bishop's seat; the term Dom instead marks it as the main church of the city. It served as the election and coronation church of the Holy Roman Empire, a role that made it a symbol of national unity in the nineteenth century.
- Although English speakers call it a cathedral, the building has never held that official rank, since it never had a bishop's seat.
Photo: rupp.de (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Alte Oper
1880–1981 · Richard Lucae
It stands in the banking district behind a square still called Opernplatz, its nineteenth-century exterior preserved even though the interior was rebuilt from a wartime ruin into a concert hall that reopened in 1981.
The Alte Oper opened in 1880 as Frankfurt's opera house, designed by Richard Lucae, who died three years before its completion. Bombing destroyed the building in 1944, and it stood as a ruin for decades before being rebuilt in the 1970s as a concert hall with a large auditorium and several smaller venues, reopening in 1981. The square in front is still known as Opernplatz. Its stage saw the premieres of Schreker's Der ferne Klang and Orff's Carmina Burana in 1937, before Frankfurt's opera company moved elsewhere in 1951.
- Carl Orff's Carmina Burana had its first performance here, in 1937.
- The architect died three years before the building he designed was completed.
Photo: Thomas Wolf, www.foto-tw.de (CC BY-SA 3.0 de)
St. Paul's Church
1789–1833 · Johann Friedrich Christian Hess
It is unusual among churches for its plan: a neoclassical circular building, now emptied of its historic interior and used instead as an exhibition, memorial and meeting space rather than for worship.
St Paul's Church was built between 1789 and 1833 to replace the medieval Barfüßerkirche, demolished in 1786, and served as Frankfurt's main Protestant church until 1944. Designed by Johann Friedrich Christian Hess in a neoclassical, circular plan, it became the meeting place of the Frankfurt National Assembly in 1848–49, the first all-German parliament, and alongside Hambach Castle a lasting symbol of the country's democratic movement. Almost nothing of the interior from that era survives; the building is now used for exhibitions, memorials and civic gatherings rather than worship.
- Almost nothing survives from the interior of its most historically significant era, the 1848–49 parliament.
- It replaced a medieval church that had already been demolished three years before construction began.
Photo: ArcCan (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Eschenheimer Turm
1428
As the oldest and least altered structure in an otherwise largely rebuilt district, it stands out as a distinctly medieval tower amid its modern surroundings, a surviving fragment of the city's former fortifications.
Eschenheimer Turm was a city gate and part of the late-medieval fortifications, erected at the beginning of the fifteenth century. It stands in what was then Frankfurt's Neustadt, or new town, an area rebuilt extensively over the centuries and now known as the Innenstadt, or city centre. Despite that wider reconstruction, the tower itself survives as the oldest and least altered building in the district, a rare intact fragment of the fortifications that once encircled the medieval city.
Photo: Jürgen Matern (CC BY-SA 3.0)
History
Frankfurt was first recorded in 794 and became a free imperial city in 1372, holding that status for nearly five centuries while serving as an election and coronation site for Holy Roman emperors. The Römer became the city hall in 1405, after the council bought it from the merchant family whose name it bears. St. Paul's Church, finished in 1833, hosted the Frankfurt National Assembly of 1848–49, the first all-German parliament, and is remembered as a symbol of the country's democratic movement. Prussia annexed the city in 1866, ending its independence. Allied bombing in the Second World War gutted the Alte Oper and left much of the old town in ruins; reconstruction of that quarter, including replicas of buildings lost in the war, continued until 2018.