From bread and pigs to thimbles and bikinis

Southwest Germany, the German federal state of Baden-Württemberg, is known for its rich cultural heritage. Alongside grand palaces, mighty castles and industrial monuments are glamourous theatres, opera houses and world-class exhibition halls. But there are also quirky museums that are amusing, intriguing and even bizarre, especially in the towns and villages between the Tauber Valley and Freiburg.

Miles from the old border with East Germany, Pforzheim’s DDR Museum is the only museum in the western federal states that examines the history of the DDR in the Communist era. Its aim is to raise awareness of democracy, address human rights and promote discussion about what went on from 1945 to the fall of the wall in 1990. With numerous exhibits from all areas of society, the message is aimed particularly at the younger generation, who only know life after German reunification. Particularly helpful are the “living history books”, the museum guides who lived in the DDR and can describe what life was like under a dictatorship. Pforzheim is an hour northwest of Stuttgart.

gdr-museum-pforzheim.en

Paintings featuring loaves of bread and grain harvests; sculptures with bread; special exhibitions about the importance of bread through the ages: all are under one roof at the Museum Bread and Art. Founded in 1955 in Ulm, 90 minutes southeast of Stuttgart, and set in a 400-year-old house, the world's first bread museum has two themes: art and bread. The art collection ranges from the 15th to the 21st century and features renowned painters, such as Rembrandt, Chagall and Picasso, as well as Pieter Breughel and Salvador Dalí. Then there are monthly events dealing with bread in a cultural or historical context, including baking specially-shaped bread for traditional seasonal treats.

museumbrotundkunst.de/en

With its gloriously sunny climate, SouthWest Germany is famous for its wines. And the sunniest vineyards of all are on the Kaiserstuhl, three hours southwest of Stuttgart. Here, in the charming wine village of Burkheim, an ancient barn is home to the Corkscrew Museum (Korkenzieher Museum). Described by a German newspaper as “perhaps the smallest and most unusual museum in Germany”, it holds the private collection of Bernhard Maurer. What started in 1995 with a purchase in flea market now extends to more than 1,000 examples of gadgets designed to remove corks from bottles. That challenge dates back 350 years, to the time when corks were first used to seal wine in bottles. On a guided tour, Bernhard himself regales visitors with tales about uncorking bottles. And entry to his museum is free.

korkenzieher.de