Bergisch Gladbach: Paper, Poetry and Art
Accommodation in Bergisch Gladbach
Paper, poetry, and art give Bergisch Gladbach its own cultural identity. At the Alte Dombach Paper Mill, you can explore the history of a material, while the poetry trail connects poetry with a walk between Herrenstrunden and the Paper Museum. The city also has changing exhibitions and buildings designed by Gottfried Böhm. You can shape your trip around individual museum visits or combine different cultural themes.
File:Schloss Bensberg, Bergisch Gladbach-40086.jpg
Photo: Raimond Spekking via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Explore paper history and discover poems along the way
At the LVR Industrial Museum’s Alte Dombach Paper Mill, visitors can see how paper has been and continues to be made, first through laborious handwork over centuries and later industrially. Historic papermaking machines illustrate the individual steps. You can also make a sheet of paper yourself and watch a laboratory paper machine in operation. The visit combines the history of papermaking with hands-on insights into different processes.
Another way to explore the subject leads to Bergisch Gladbach-Herrenstrunden: The poetry trail consists of six steles, installed since 2011 between the source of the Strunde and the Alte Dombach Paper Museum. Two editions of poems are published each year. Each is launched with a walk involving the public and a supporting program featuring music or performance. If you are planning a visit, check the current program in advance.
Art and crafts in the museums
The Villa Zanders Art Museum adds another cultural highlight. It regularly hosts temporary exhibitions, mainly of contemporary art, and has a collection focus on art made from paper. Three floors provide around 1,000 square meters of exhibition space. The collection includes about 500 paper artworks by around 150 international artists. Since the exhibition program changes, check the current exhibitions if you would like to plan your visit around them.
In Bensberg, the Bergisches Museum for Mining, Handicrafts and Trade presents traditional craft techniques and the history of regional ore mining. Its program includes family days, school workshops, guided tours, and talks. There are also events, workshops, and guided tours throughout the year; on Sundays from April to November, craftspeople give demonstrations. Alongside art and paper, crafts and mining history are therefore also options to explore during your stay.
The buildings designed by Gottfried Böhm also shape the cityscape: In Bergisch Gladbach, he designed the Bergischer Löwe, the Herz-Jesu-Kirche in Schildgen, the Bethanien Children’s Village, and Bensberg Town Hall. Architecture enthusiasts can follow these four different building projects as a themed route through the city.
Bergisch Gladbach and the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis
When planning the rest of your trip, it is helpful to distinguish between the city and the wider travel destination of the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis district. The district lies at the meeting point of the greater Cologne area and the scenic Bergisches Land. Rail-based public transport in the district serves Bergisch Gladbach, Leichlingen, Rösrath, and Overath, with connections to Cologne from each town.
The Bergische Fahrradbus (Bergisches Land bike bus) is another regional option: It runs with a bike trailer along the Balkantrasse and, since 2019, has provided a connection to Bergisch Gladbach via Odenthal. Seasonal service runs from Easter to the end of October; check whether the bus is currently running before you travel. There is also a direct bus connection to the Alte Dombach Paper Mill: From Bergisch Gladbach station, the nearest S-Bahn station, take bus 426 towards Wipperfürth to the “Alte Dombach” stop. Current timetables can help you plan this journey.
Those wishing to hike in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis can choose between routes of different lengths: The Bergbauweg (Mining Trail, “Streifzug” #15) is a moderately challenging 12.06-kilometer circular route that starts and ends at Hoffnungsthal station in Rösrath. At 244 kilometers and twelve stages, the Bergischer Panoramasteig is a much longer circular hiking route through Bergisches Land Nature Park. Stages 3 and 4 pass through Biesfeld in Kürten and Dhünn in Wermelskirchen, respectively. This information helps you distinguish a single regional circuit from a multi-day hiking route.
When looking for a holiday apartment, you can start by deciding what your trip will focus on: If the paper mill, poetry trail, Villa Zanders, and the city’s buildings are your main interests, focus your search on Bergisch Gladbach. If you also want to include attractions and routes in other places in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis, take those places into account when choosing your search area.
Discover more destinations: Lückerath, Odenthal, Overath, Kürten, Wermelskirchen, Rösrath, Burscheid, Leichlingen.
Back to the main travel overview: Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis.
