Museums in GRASSI

BAUHAUS architecture: The Grassi Museum is one of the largest museum complexes in Germany and today houses three museums of international importance: the Museum of Ethnology in Leipzig, the Museum of Applied Arts and the Museum of Musical Instruments of the University of Leipzig. The building complex was built between 1925 and 1929 according to plans by the architects Zweck and Voigt under the construction management of city architect Hubert Ritter.

The building, with stylistic echoes of New Objectivity and Art Deco, is one of the few German museums built during the Weimar Republic. Bauhaus lovers will find a very special gem here: the Josef Albers windows in the museum's main staircase. Josef Albers, the Bauhaus master trained under Walter Gropius, designed the 18 windows made of flat glass in 1927. The windows, which are up to seven meters high, are made of hand-blown flashed glass and are considered to be the largest glass design of the Dessau Bauhaus period. The historical originals were destroyed in the Second World War, but the windows were able to be faithfully reconstructed using image sources.

The pillar hall of the Grassi Museum is also architecturally significant and has been restored to its former glory since its reconstruction in 2010. The representative event space was built in 1927 in the Art Deco style. The pillar hall is considered one of the most beautiful interiors of German Art Deco. The Grassi Museum uses the contrast between the Art Deco exterior facade and the typical Bauhaus glazing to illustrate the different styles in a particularly impressive way.

After a year of construction in the 2021/2022 time frame, the two tower staircases in the inner courtyard of the GRASSI Museum are shining in new splendor. The renovation of the facade areas in the Art Deco style was possible thanks to the partial funding from the federal program "Investments for national cultural institutions in Germany (INK)", so that the representative towers with the renewed window grille facades are now visible to visitors and the inner courtyard can be used for museum events in the GRASSI again without restrictions.