The Karlsruhe Zoo and other Karlsruhe, Germany Things to Do Tips

At the entrance to the Karlsruhe

zoo

by Nemorino

This is my nomination for the world's most conveniently located zoo. The front entrance is right across the street from the main railroad station, and the back entrance is not far from the Baden State Theater. So you could theoretically get off the train, leave the station, cross the street, take a leisurely walk through the zoo and go out the other end in time for the opera.

I actually did this once a couple of years ago.

It was OK, I guess, but it cost 5 Euros, which is quite much for someone who is not terribly interested in observing incarcerated animals.

If you would really like to find out about the zoo, and aren't just looking for a short cut to the theater, have a look at tini58de's Karlsruhe Zoo Tip, since she obviously knows a lot more about it than I do.

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Directions: Right across the street from the main station.
Website: http://www.karlsruhe.de/Zoo/index.htm

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Things To Do: Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe

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Updated by Nemorino

on Feb 29, 2008

1. Badisches Staatstheater

Karlsruhe

by Nemorino , 4 more photos

The Baden State Theater is the main venue in Karlsruhe for opera, drama and ballet.

The current building was opened in 1975. The acoustics are fine. You can see and hear perfectly well from any seat in the place.

The only thing that takes a bit of getting used to is the fact that the inside walls are made of undisguised concrete, painted but otherwise not covered up in any way, so you can see the pattern of the wooden boards that the concrete was poured into. I found this rather crude at first, like being in a construction site or somebody's basement, but once you get accustomed to it it's all right.

The large hall seats just over 1000 people (as opposed to 1300 and some in Frankfurt).

An interesting feature of the Karlsruhe stage is that they have a revolving stage surrounded by three concentric rings that can also revolve independently in the same or the opposite direction. This arrangement is used to good effect in their new production of Arrigo Boito's Mefistofele, which has a large curved bookshelf on the revolving stage and another on the first concentric ring, so you get nice visual effects and rapid changes of scene as soon as they both start turning.

See my travelogue "Behind the scenes in Karlsruhe" for more information on this interesting theater.

Second photo: The theater with flowers.

Third photo: Inside the theater.

Fourth photo: Stage entrance, with bicycles.

Fifth photo: This horse sculpture in front of the theater is called Musengaul (Muse's Nag), by Jürgen Goertz. If it looks vaguely familiar, perhaps you have seen the similar, but bigger, "S-Printing Horse" by the same artist, on my Heídelberg page.

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Phone: 07 21 / 93 33 33
Address: Baumeisterstr. 11, Karlsruhe
Directions: Near Ettlinger Tor, which is also the name of the streetcar stop. (Ettlinger Tor/Staatstheater).
Website: http://www.staatstheater.karlsruhe.de/

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Things To Do: The Margrave's Palace

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Updated by Nemorino

on Dec 17, 2006

1. The Margrave's Palace in

Karlsruhe

by Nemorino , 3 more photos

The graffito on the base of the statue says "Recht auf Freiraum", which means "Right to Free Space" -- or to Freedom, Tolerance or Scope for Development. Why the anonymous graffiti-writer wrote that here I don't know, since it would seem the Margrave left lots of free space in the gardens all around the palace. But I expect he or she had some reason.

Second photo: Here's a closer look at that statue, which shows a large muscular man wrestling with a lion. Actually he has already subdued the lion and is holding its mouth open with his hands. So any of you lions that might get loose in Karlsruhe, beware! They don't mess around.

Third photo: Bicycles parked in front of the palace at sunset.

Fourth photo: VT member Madschick (third from left) playing boules in front of the palace at dusk.

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Website: http://www1.karlsruhe.de/Historie/Stadtrundgang/ge1.en.htm

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Things To Do: Museum in the Palace

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Written by Nemorino

on Dec 17, 2006

1. Badisches Landesmuseum

by Nemorino , 3 more photos

The Margrave's Palace is the main venue of the Baden State Museum (Badisches Landesmuseum). This is a large museum of art and culture from prehistoric times up to the present, with emphasis on the history of the German South-West (particularly Baden, which is this end of Baden-Württemberg) in the 16th through 19th centuries.

Second photo: Sign at the entrance: Free admission on Fridays from 2:00 p.m.

Third photo: In various parts of the museum there are rooms that have been reconstructed to show how people used to live in this area in earlier centuries.

Fourth photo: Throne of His Highness the Margrave.

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Phone: +49 (0) 721 / 926 6514
Address: Schloss, 76131 Karlsruhe
Website: http://www.landesmuseum.de/website/

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Things To Do: The Palace Tower

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Written by Nemorino

on Dec 17, 2006

1. People on the balcony of the

Palace Tower

by Nemorino , 4 more photos

Admission to the Museum includes access to the Palace Tower, where you can get good views of Karlsruhe and the Palace Gardens. Like the palace itself, the tower was first built between 1715 and 1718 at the behest of the Margrave Karl Wilhelm of Baden-Durlach (1679 - 1738).

Second photo: Looking south from the Palace Tower. View of the Palace Gardens and Karlsruhe.

Third photo: Looking north from the Palace Tower.

Fourth photo: The spiral staircase going up the tower.

Fifth photo: People on the tower balcony at sunset.

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Phone: +49 (0) 721 / 926 6514
Address: Schloss, 76131 Karlsruhe
Website: http://www.landesmuseum.de/website/

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Things To Do: The Tulip Girls

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Updated by Nemorino

on Jan 14, 2007

1. A baroque statue in front of the

Palace

by Nemorino , 1 more photos

Three quarters of the way up the tower you come to one of the rooms where the Tulip Girls used to live. Here you are greeted by a sign saying you have already climbed up 121 steps and have only 37 more to get to the top.

Originally there were 24 rooms for the Tulip Girls, who were young women from Karlsruhe and vicinity. The Margrave had about sixty of them on the payroll every year between 1717 and 1733. This is documented in the payroll records kept by the palace administration during that period.

The Margrave's horticultural, musical and amorous interests were all dealt with by the Tulip Girls, who were charged with caring for his collection of tulips imported at great expense from Holland. A tulip bulb at that time could cost as much as 40 Gulden, which was twice as much as a washerwoman could expect to earn in an entire year. The Margrave once journeyed to Holland himself to buy bulbs, and he also employed painters to paint pictures of the best tulips that bloomed in the palace gardens in the spring.

When the Tulip Girls weren't tending tulips, they were expected to sing in the many concerts and operas that the Margrave put on in the palace for himself and his courtiers.

Inevitably there were rumors that the Tulip Girls also had certain other duties in the palace, and in fact many of them had illegitimate children named Carl or Carlina who were cared for in the palace at the Margrave's expense.

Not everyone was amused by the Margrave and his Tulip Girls. His wife complained in a private letter about "Carl's ridiculous harem", and several German dramatists of the 18th century, such as Lessing and Schiller, wrote bourgois tragedies about upright young women who were driven to suicide by the lust of the local rulers -- though they seem to have had other, worse, potentates in mind than the Margrave of Baden-Durlach.

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Directions:

Second photo: One of the rooms in the tower where the Tulip Girls used to live.

Website: http://www.landesmuseum.de/website/Deutsch/Sammlungsausstellungen/Schloss/Schlossturm_Tulpenmaedchen.htm

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Things To Do: ZKM – Center for Art and Media

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Updated by Nemorino

on Jul 8, 2007

1. ZKM – Center for Art and Media

by Nemorino , 4 more photos

The ZKM opened in 1997 in the center of this former factory building, which also houses art museums in its northern and southern sections.

ZKM stands for Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie, which they have shortened to Center for Art and Media in their English name.

Aside from being a mind-blowing media museum, the ZKM includes an Institute for Visual Media, an Institute for Music und Acoustics, an Institute for Media, Education, and Economics and a Film Institute, which means that the whole place is full of creative-looking young people (some with babies on their arms, some without), who in large parts of the building are very obviously creating things. In short, it's a great place to loiter around and try to figure out what is going on.

Second photo: A look at one of the inner courtyards of the ZKM.

Third photo: Looking down at one of the dozens (or hundreds?) of interactive video or whatever-media projections.

Fourth photo: Tucked off in an obscure corner of the ZKM is the world's oldest still-functioning vacuum tube computer, a Zuse Z22 with the serial number 13, meaning it was the thirteenth of fifty-five such computers that Konrad Zuse's company built starting in 1957. For more on the inventor Konrad Zuse, please see my Bad Hersfeld, Berlin and Munich pages.

Fifth photo: Look ma, no transistors! It's all done with vacuum tubes, 415 of them to be exact.

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Phone: +49(0)721-8100-0
Address: Lorenzstraße 19, D-76135 Karlsruhe
Directions: Tram number 2. Get off at "ZKM".
Website: http://on1.zkm.de/zkm/e/about

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Things To Do: ZKM – Museum of New Art

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Written by Nemorino

on Dec 17, 2006

1. ZKM – Museum of New Art

by Nemorino , 2 more photos

At the northern end of the factory building there is a large Museum of New Art which says it is dedicated to showing the development of European and American Art from 1960 to the present.

When I was there, though, I didn't see any of that old Euro-American 20th century stuff. It was all squarely 21st century, and all Chinese -- masses of modern artworks about the development of big Chinese cities in the last few years.

Second photo: Courtyard of the ZKM.

Third photo: One of the hanging staircases that cuts through the Museum of New Art at odd angles.

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Phone: +49(0)721-8100-0
Address: Lorenzstraße 19, D-76135 Karlsruhe
Directions: Tram number 2. Get off at "ZKM".
Website: http://on1.zkm.de/zkm/MuseumfuerNeueKunst

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Things To Do: Städtische Galerie Karlsruhe (City Gallery)

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Written by Nemorino

on Dec 17, 2006

1. Städtische Galerie Karlsruhe

(City Gallery)

by Nemorino , 2 more photos

This large art museum is at the northern end of the factory building which also houses the ZKM, but the inner doors are locked so you have to go out and walk around to get from one to the other.

When I was there they were showing an exhibition of over 400 art works from all periods and styles, all having to do with cats. I'm sure my grandmother would have been fascinated if only she had lived to see this. (She'd be 129 years old if she were still alive.)

Second photo: Group with cat.

Third photo: Nude with cats.

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Phone: (0721) 133-4401 or -4444
Address: Lorenzstraße 27, D-76135 Karlsruhe
Directions: Tram number 2. Get off at "ZKM". There is a large cinema at the corner, and the museum is just behind the cinema.
Website: http://www.karlsruhe.de/kultur/ausstellungen/staedtische_galerie/

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Things To Do: Prinz-Max-Palais

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Written by Nemorino

on Aug 6, 2006

Prinz-Max-Palais

by Nemorino