Where to Stay in Pforzheim, Baden-Württemberg

What is Pforzheim known for?

Jewellery and watch-making built Pforzheim's trade, and the jewellery museum Pforzheim now holds the results of it, with the Pforzheim Galerie taking the fine art rather than the metalwork. Goldstadt is the shorthand. The DDR-Museum Pforzheim covers something else entirely, while the Wildpark Pforzheim gives families a day that has nothing to do with either.

What are the main landmarks in Pforzheim?

The jewellery museum Pforzheim is the reason most people come. Pforzheim Galerie and the DDR-Museum Pforzheim complete the museum quarter, while the Wildpark Pforzheim and the Sender Pforzheim-Stadt mark two very different edges of the built-up ground. Castles ring the town.

Burg Hoheneck, Burgruine Kräheneck, and Burg Rabeneck stand at three separate points, with the Wartturm and the Hachel-Tower left from the older defences. Stadtkirche, the Liebfrauenkirche, the Lutherkirche, and St. Franziskus divide the parishes between them.

What is the history of Pforzheim?

Romans left their tableware behind. The Samian Ware Discovery Site is the earliest thing recorded here, imported pottery in the ground beside three rivers that were reason enough for anyone to settle. Castles followed the rivers up.

Burg Hoheneck, the Burgruine Kräheneck, and Burg Rabeneck were raised at separate points around the valleys, and the Wartturm and the Hachel-Tower belong to the same business of watching the approaches. Altstadtkirche St. Martin is older than most of what surrounds it. Metal made the modern city.

Jewellery and watch-making turned Pforzheim into the Goldstadt, a name that stuck to the place long after the workshops changed hands, and the jewellery museum Pforzheim exists because of that trade rather than despite it. War took the old town. Rebuilding after it produced the functional centre that stands around the Stadtkirche and the Heilig-Geist-Spital Pforzheim, which is why the Barfüßerkirche Pforzheim and the Liebfrauenkirche read as survivors.

Dillweißenstein and Eutingen kept their own churches. The Heiliggeistkirche Dillweißenstein and the Evangelische Kirche Eutingen still mark those villages, while the DDR-Museum Pforzheim, the Sender Pforzheim-Stadt, and the Wildpark Pforzheim all belong to the later city.

Where is Pforzheim?

Three rivers come in here. The Enz, the Nagold, and the Würm converge at Pforzheim, and the town spreads along all three valleys rather than around a single centre. The Black Forest begins at the edge. Karlsruhe lies one way and Stuttgart the other, which puts Pforzheim between them on the northern rim of the forest, while Dillweißenstein and Eutingen sit out where the built ground thins.

A temperate climate settles over the three valleys.

What is the climate of Pforzheim?

The Black Forest does the work. Air coming off the high ground behind Pforzheim keeps the nights cooler than the open country beyond, and the valleys of the Enz, the Nagold, and the Würm channel whatever weather arrives straight through the built-up ground. Rain is never far off.

Wildpark Pforzheim and the paths up towards the Wartturm are the first things a wet week spoils, which is when the jewellery museum Pforzheim gets busy.

How do you get to Pforzheim?

Karlsruhe and Stuttgart bracket the approach. Pforzheim sits between the two, which makes it a stop on the way rather than the end of a line, and most arrivals come in along the valleys the Enz and the Nagold cut through the hills. Walkers go the other direction.

The Black Forest paths start at the edge of the built ground near the Wartturm, and the jewellery museum Pforzheim, the Pforzheim Galerie, and the Stadtkirche all sit within a few streets of the centre. Dillweißenstein needs a short ride out.