Goethe-Museum Düsseldorf

The Goethe-Museum Düsseldorf is located in Schloss Jägerhof at Jacobistraße 2, on the edge of the Hofgarten in Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is one of the principal collections devoted to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), and it is based on the private collection of the publisher Anton Kippenberg and his wife Katharina, which was assembled in the early 20th century and later made public. The museum opened in the 1950s in the Jägerhof, a Rococo hunting palace built in the 1760s for the Palatinate court by Johann Joseph Couven and Nicolas de Pigage, one of the notable buildings of the city. The collection contains manuscripts, letters, first editions, drawings, medals, busts and portraits, and objects from Goethe's circle, and it is among the largest Goethe holdings outside Weimar and Frankfurt. The museum shows Goethe's life and work, his relations with the Düsseldorf area, where he visited the philosopher Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi at Pempelfort in 1774, and the wider cultural world of the Enlightenment and Weimar Classicism. The curatorial approach is both chronological and thematic, with rooms on his writing, his scientific interests and his reception. The palace was damaged in the Second World War, repaired and has been used as a museum since. Opening hours are usually Tuesday to Sunday afternoons and the fare should be confirmed at goethe-museum.com. The museum stands beside the Hofgarten, so a visit pairs well with a walk through the park, and the Kunstpalast and Ehrenhof ensemble are a short distance away. Most labelling is in German, so check for English information at the desk.