Staufen im Breisgau

Staufen im Breisgau combines an outstanding vineyard site with a protected historic townscape and several museums. Choose different priorities when deciding on your destination: views and a castle, city history and crafts, tango, or a street festival featuring wine and live music. The following places and themes provide a practical framework for planning your stay around your own interests.

Schlossberg and Historic Town Layout

Schlossberg is an outstanding vineyard site in Staufen. With the castle ruins of the Lords of Staufen, it has been a landmark of the town since the days when it could be seen from afar. From the castle, you can look out over the entire town. Winegrowing, a historic landmark and a viewpoint thus come together at the same distinctive place—three different reasons to consider Staufen as a travel destination.

The townscape itself is also protected as a whole: the carefully planned historic town layout is designated as a protected monument and overall ensemble. Its features include the market square, Marktstraße (now Hauptstraße), rows of terraced houses, streams running through the town and fountains. The historic ensemble therefore encompasses more than a single building: the arrangement of these features is also part of the protected townscape.

Museums of City History, Crafts and Music

The Town Museum in the town hall presents Staufen’s history through historical objects. Its main exhibition themes include Staufen Castle, the figure of the legendary black magician Johannes Faust, the history of the crafts and contemporary cultural life in Staufen. The topics thus range from historical heritage to cultural life today.

The Staufen Ceramics Museum is housed in a former potter’s house, the only surviving evidence of the town’s pottery tradition, which has flourished since the Middle Ages. The workshop of the Maier-Bregger potter family is completely preserved. Its surviving features include a clay pit, potter’s wheel, drying rack and wood-fired kilns. The building has been a ceramics museum with a reputation beyond the region since 1991. Every year, the Baden State Museum Karlsruhe presents a special exhibition there featuring ceramics from all periods. In this one house, visitors can therefore see the preserved workshop of a Staufen potter family alongside an exhibition spanning every era.

The Tango & Bandoneon Museum, which opened in Kapuzinerhof Staufen in 2014, offers a different cultural focus. It displays the unique Steinhart Collection, with 450 bandoneons and extensive documentation on the history of tango. The association that runs the museum also offers courses in Argentine tango, as well as concerts and film screenings. Alongside the collection, the program therefore includes events and courses related to tango.

Special Buildings and Activities

The cast-iron bridge over the Neumagen near Café Decker has an unusual history. It was made in 1845 as part of the Baden Main Line for a railway bridge near Kenzingen, then relocated to Staufen in 1871 to serve as a road bridge. Today, it is one of the few surviving cast-iron bridges in Germany. Its design is unique: the roadway is suspended between the side girders. Its construction and subsequent relocation mark two different chapters in its history—it was initially intended as a railway bridge, then came to Staufen as a road bridge.

For an outdoor-focused stay, Staufen Adventure Forest offers nine courses in the Staufen municipal forest. Staufen also has a railway line operated by the Südwestdeutsche Eisenbahngesellschaft (SWEG). You can reach the adventure forest by the Münstertalbahn; from there, a short, steep walk of just under ten minutes leads to your destination. Allow for this walk when planning your journey and check the current timetable before setting off.

Wine and Music

“Wine and Music” is a three-day street festival in Staufen. Staufen winemakers and restaurateurs serve fine wines and selected delicacies. From Friday evening through Sunday, there is live music on stages at the market square, Kronenplatz and the wine fountain. If you want to plan your stay around the event, check the dates before your trip.

Discover more destinations: Bötzingen, Buggingen, Sankt Märgen, Gundelfingen, Badenweiler, Dittishausen, Freiburg im Breisgau, Eisenbach.

For the overview of the wider region: Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald.