Micha Ullman is an Israeli artist and was appointed Professor of Sculpture at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart between 1991 and 2005. While he lived in Stuttgart, he created several artworks, three of them are known (or better, not know to many people :-)) as Minimente. And one Miniment is New Moon in front of castle Solitude.

The name Miniment is perfectly chosen for those artworks. They are not monuments, standing somewhere tall in the landscape, screaming “look at me” at everyone close by. Ullmans Minimente are tiny and even if you know where they are supposed to be, you need to look really hard to find them (friends of mine gave up after looking for them for ten minutes and even I had to ask in the museum shop if someone can show me the New Moon 🙂 ). But that is part of their fascination! 🙂 When you have found them finally you feel like a member of a secret club!

But what is the New Moon you might ask now. It consists of 29 little holes in the floor. They look the differnt shapes of the moon – from full moon to crescent moon. The tiny moons are arranged in a circle of nearly 16 meters in radius and represent the circle of the moon. When the sun moves over castle Solitude and the New Moon, the walls of the 29 moon shaped holes throw tiny shadows. So the artwork changes every day and every minute with the change of the light and the seasons.

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Stuttgart Cable Car, Standseilbahn in German, opened on 30 October 1929. At that time it was the first with automatic steerage! The conductor only had to press a button to operate the railway. Until today two cars run between Südheimer Platz and Waldfriedhof to facilitate visitors all the way up to the forest cemetery. 

Stuttgart Cable Car is actually a funicular railway. This means that the cars are connected with a cable which loops over a pulley wheel at the upper end of a track. When one car is descending, it pulls the other one up. You can see the wheel at the upper station.

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When locals talk about Birkenkopf, they usually refer to this hill “Monte Scherbelino”. Sounds Italian, right? But it’s not, it’s “fake Italian” and could be translated to “Mount Debris”. And when you walk all the way up to the top of Birkenkopf aka Monte Scherbelino, you might get an idea where that name comes from: the higher you climb, the more pieces of broken facades of houses you see next to the path. Strange, right?

In the years between 1953 and 1957 around 15,000,000 cubic metres of debris were deposited on top of Birkenkopf, making it rise 40 meters. This debris stems from the ruins of buildings that were destroyed during World War II in Stuttgart. This makes this hill not only a beautiful viewpoint but also a memorial for the destructive power of wars.

You can also visit masses up there. For more information and dates visit www.kirche-im-gruenen.de/orte/birkenkopf-monte-scherbelino/

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One every side of the building you find a word written on the facade: library. But in four different languages. When you look at the building from the west, it says “Library”, from the north “Bibliothek“. On the wall facing the south you find the word library written in Arabic and from the East in Korean – because the architect of the new city library is South Korean.

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Where the Metropol Cinema is located today used to be the first central train station of Stuttgart. King Wilhelm I wanted the station to be in the center of Stuttgart and so the location close to the New Castle was chosen. When it was opened in 1846 it operated four tracks and you could catch a train to Ludwigsburg and Esslingen from here. However, the station grew too small quickly and all that is left of it today are the pillars and the semicircular arches that marks the entrance to the cinema.

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The Stadtpalais is located close to the U-Bahn station Charlottenplatz in a beautiful building that’s also known under the name Wilhelmspalais (because king Wilhelm II used to live here). It is home of the new museum of Stuttgart and well worth a visit (entrance to the permanent exhibition is free of charge!) as you will learn heaps about the history of our city. (->If you want to find out more, visit my post A museum for our city: Stadtpalais Stuttgart.)

When you enter Stadtpalais you will stand in a hall. And when you look up you will see a very extraordinary chandelier.

Fun fact: The chandelier is made of five streetlights, the same you will find all over Stuttgart! They are even attached to the energy circle of the real streetlights and will light up with them! What a fun idea and a great symbol of the museums purpose: bringing the life of the streets of Stuttgart into this new museum!

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Feuerseeplatz in Stuttgart-West is a beautiful place. The old church Johanneskirche looks like a miniature version of Notre Dame in Paris and the stairs invite you to sit down and relax for a while. But have you ever observed the water and the shore more closely?

Fun Fact: This tiny lake is not only home of some (very big!) fish but also of turtles! You can see them swimming around in there and on a warm day they lay outside the lake to soak up some sun! 🙂 I guess they used to be pets but their owners must have set them free at some point…

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These buildings date back to the late 19th century and a period called “Gründerzeit”. In these days a law existed that said there must be a 2,9 meter long gap, the “Bauwich”, between houses.  In the event of a fire it should reduce the risk of the fire spreading from one building to the next. Nowadays these gaps are the entrance to the backyard of the Gründerzeit-buildings.

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Fun Fact: The Schwabtunnel was not only the widest tunnel at that time, with its 10.5 meter in width. It is also the first tunnel a car drove through. Ever.

Well, only adequate for the car town that Stuttgart is 🙂

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