Visit Lübeck

A walk around Lübeck's Old Town feels like you've been thrown right into the late Middle Ages: The roads and lanes are covered with cobble stones; the gabled houses are built from red brick and decorated with tiles; the church towers reach high into the sky. There are beautiful courtyards and narrow lanes at every turn leading to who knows where.

Lübeck was built in the second half of the 13th century and is one of the best preserved historic towns in Germany. The massive brick-red Holsten gate is one of the best known buildings in Germany. In 1987, the Lübeck Old Town was declared a World Cultural Heritage Site by UNESCO.

International trade has a long history in Lübeck. In 1358, Lübeck formed an economic alliance, the so-called "Hanseatic League", with other North German trade towns. The 150 Hanse towns went on to dominate the entire trade in the Baltic and North Sea - for one and a half centuries. Lübeck was the "Queen of the Hanseatic League" and took the lead in the alliance, making it the most important town in northern Germany at the time.

The town of Nobel Prize winners

But Lübeck is not just about impressive buildings that tell the story of the town's former commercial grandeur, it's also a town of considerable literary importance. The "Buddenbrookhaus" is a visible example - the old grand patrician house got this nickname after German author Thomas Mann received the Nobel Prize for Literature for his novel "Buddenbrooks", in which he describes the slow downfall of a wealthy mercantile family of Lübeck.

Many parts of the famous novel are set in the building, which stands out among the red brick houses it is surrounded by. For a long time, the inhabitants of Lübeck were not particularly pleased, because Thomas Mann paints an unflattering picture of many citizens in the novel. But those days are long gone. Today, Thomas Mann is an honorary citizen of Lübeck, and the house where he was born, built in 1758, is a tourist attraction. It hosts a museum which pays tribute to the life and works of brothers Thomas and Heinrich Mann.

A short walking distance away is another famous address: Glockengießerstraße 21. This is where you go if you want to find out more about Lübeck's second famous Literature Nobel Prize winner, Günter Grass. The author of "The Tin Drum" had many other talents: There are sketches and sculptures by the artist on display. Günter Grass died aged 87 in April 2015.

The town's sons include a former chancellor

Lübeck's third Nobel Prize winner is former German Chancellor Willy Brandt. He was born here in 1913. In 1971, he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his detente policy with then-communist eastern Europe, the "Neue Ostpolitik". In 2007, the Willy Brandt house opened its doors with a permanent exhibition about the charismatic politician, who significantly shaped Germany's Social Democratic Party. The Willy Brandt center is a stone's throw away from the Günter Grass house.

Lübeck may well be a town in the North of Germany on the Baltic Sea coast, but it has its own red wine - even though it doesn't have any vineyards. The grapes used for "Lübeck Rotspon" are imported from the Bordeaux region in France, the young wine is shelved in wood barrels in Lübeck and gets its special note from ripening in the northern German climate. This is of course best tested in one of the many wine cellars in town.

Marzipan is a must

After a stroll around town, visitors should stop in one of Lübeck's many cafés and taste the typical marzipan bread that Lübeck is world-famous for. There are many legends about the origin of this culinary delight made from almonds, sugar and rose water. One legend has it that bakers ran out of flour during a famine, and baked a substitute kind of bread from almonds. Whether this story is true or not - marzipan from Lübeck is a must, and not just at Christmas time.