Ilmenau spa district

Ilmenau Bad train station

Villa Silvana

Villa Waldruhe

An Art Nouveau villa on Waldstrasse

Old spa park

Goethe School House I.

Festival hall

The Ilmenau spa district is a district of the Thuringian university town of Ilmenau . Its name is derived from the fact that the spa facilities of the former Bad Ilmenau used to be here . It is located on the edge of the forest in the Gabelbachtal and has therefore been a preferred residential area since it was built.

Location in urban space

The spa district is located in the southwest of the city between the old town and the Thuringian Forest . It is roughly in the shape of a triangle and is bordered by the Ilm in the north, by Herderstrasse in the east and by Preller and Hertzer promenade in the southwest. Behind the Prellerpromenade are the forests of the Kickelhahn and behind the Hertzerpromenade on the other side of the Gabelbach are the forests of the Lindenberg .

The spa district has two main streets that begin in the area of ​​the Tannenbrücke over the Ilm. From the Tannenbrücke to the southwest, the Waldstraße runs, which turns into the Gabelbachstraße (formerly known as Frauenwalder Chaussee ) on the outskirts and leads as the K 53 district road to Frauenwald and Neustadt am Rennsteig and to Kickelhahn. Side streets of Waldstrasse are Goetheallee, Scheffelstrasse and Thomas-Mann-Strasse. Goetheallee runs west on the Ilm valley slope. It also includes Schillerstraße, Theodor-Körner-Straße and Baumbachstraße as side streets. The eastern main street is Herderstraße, which runs south from the Tannenbrücke. Your side streets in the spa district are Scheffelstraße, Fröbelstraße and Ritzebühl.

In some cases, Naumannstrasse and Schleusinger Allee can also be counted as part of the spa district, which are between the Ilm and the Rennsteigbahn . The Rennsteigbahn runs parallel to Goetheallee through the spa district and connected Ilmenau with Schleusingen until 1998 . At the moment, local rail transport to Stützerbach and occasional steam locomotive trips only take place here on weekends . By the end of 2007, the Ilmenau Bad station near the Tannenbrücke had connected the district to the railway line to Erfurt .

The streets in the spa district usually bear the names of people who visited Ilmenau for recreational purposes or who were involved in the Gabelbach community :

• Goetheallee: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , worked in Ilmenau as Mining Minister and also visited the city for recreation and for scientific studies during his time in Weimar.
• Schillerstrasse: Friedrich Schiller , whether he was ever in Ilmenau, is highly controversial and not proven. The local researcher Paul Bleisch also doubted this in 1910, but there is a Schillerhöhe on the Ehrenberg .
• Baumbachstrasse: Rudolf Baumbach was a member of the Gabelbach community and therefore visited Ilmenau from time to time.
• Scheffelstrasse: Joseph Victor von Scheffel , was also a member of the Gabelbach community
• Fröbelstrasse: Friedrich Fröbel , came from near Ilmenau, but has no further connection with the city. This road used to be named after August Trinius , who first published hiking literature about the Thuringian Forest.
• Thomas-Mann-Straße: was named after Thomas Mann during the GDR era , the previous namesake was the Ilmenau industrialist August Alt .
• Herderstrasse: Johann Gottfried Herder , visited Ilmenau several times during his time in Weimar to find relaxation here.
• Naumannstrasse: Hermann Naumann was an industrialist from Ilmenau.

history

The first buildings in the area were built towards the end of the 19th century and served as spa facilities for air and cold water cures. At the turn of the century, the first villas were built in the quarter in addition to the spa facilities. Until about 1930 all streets were built on with villas, in which mostly the manufacturers of the city lived. Many of these villas are named after the wives of the builders (e.g. Villa Erika , Haus Margarethe ). The predominant styles are the Wilhelminian style , Art Nouveau and, in the later phase, influences from the Bauhaus . After the fall of the Wall in 1990, most of the villas were renovated, so that the quarter is now one of the most expensive residential areas in the city.

Buildings

The largest villa in the district is Villa Waldruhe at the end of Waldstrasse. It was used as a youth hostel until the new youth hostel on the tunnel was completed in the 1990s.

To the north is the Alte Kurpark , opposite the Lessingpark with the reading hall. The Alte Kurpark was the first park in the area and is traversed by the Gabelbach , which also feeds a small pond there. On the southern edge of the district in the Gabelbachtal lies the Ritzebühler pond , which is also fed by the Gabelbach and over which the Goethe grammar school, built in 1922, is located. It has a long tradition as a special science school with boarding school.

In the Gabelbachtal, some of the city's sports facilities are attached to the district. There have been tennis courts here since the early 20th century. There is also a downhill slope, which is also used as a downhill run, as well as a ski jump and a curling rink. The Ilmenau bobsleigh run, which is no longer used today, was also located here.

At the end of Naumannstrasse is the festival hall, built in 1937/38 according to plans by Ernst Flemming, behind which the large city park in the Ilm valley extends. It is executed in the neoclassical style and is considered to be the forerunner of the GDR culture houses from the 1950s. A parade ground was created in front of the hall, which was later converted into a parking lot. A south wing adjoins the main building, in which the park café was housed. There, influences from the architecture of the 1920s are still visible through the "round corners".

The house at Naumannstrasse 9 is also noteworthy. It was built by Arthur Schröder from Hanover between 1929 and 1932 in the Bauhaus style in a cubist style. The two-storey building with a flat roof has large groups of windows facing south, with a balcony and terrace in front of them.

Spa promenades

Between the forest and the spa district, the two Ilmenau spa promenades lie parallel to the edge of the forest.

The Prellerpromenade between Ilm- and Gabelbachtal is the older of the two. It runs at the foot of the Kickelhahn and was inaugurated on June 1, 1894. It was named after the long-time director of the Ilmenau cold water sanatorium, Dr. Emil Preller (1836-1893). It begins at the Friedrich Hofmann monument in Waldstrasse and ends after 800 meters at Goetheallee. In the area of ​​the Prellerpromenade there are 15 “squares”, most of which consist of a monument to an Ilmenau personality, framed in a stone semicircle at the edge of the path and lined with benches.

The Hertzerpromenade runs east of the Prellerpromenade from the Gabelbachtal to the Ilmenau summer toboggan run at the foot of the Lindenberg. From here you have a good view of the city. In the area of ​​the Hertzerpromenade, which was inaugurated on June 19, 1899, there are ten places with monuments. It is about 1000 meters long in total. It was named after the Ilmenau mayor Johann Christian Hertzer (1807–1884).

swell

1. ↑ according to Thuringia Architecture Guide 2 - From the Bauhaus to today, p. 316

literature

• A visit to Ilmenau . In: Illustrirte Zeitung . No. 14 . J. J. Weber, Leipzig September 30, 1843, p. 218-222 ( books.google.de ).
• Reinhard Döring: The Ilmenau Promenades . City administration Ilmenau, 1999, ISBN 3-929730-25-1 .
• Ulrich Wieler u. a .: Architectural Guide Thuringia 2 - From the Bauhaus to today . Publishing house of the Bauhaus University Weimar, 2006, ISBN 3-86068-278-4 .

Web links

Commons : Ilmenauer Kurviertel  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 50 ° 41 ′  N , 10 ° 54 ′  E