By Jacqueline Swartz. Walkers stroll the flower-dotted paths and hikers can trek up hills or attempt to summit the 2,ft Merkur Mountain. The Romans discovered the thermal waters 2, years ago, as you can see in the open-air museum that displays the remnants of their baths.
But the time that still resonates is the s, when the town was the summer residence of French, German and Russian aristocrats and artists. Clara Schumann, the noted Romantic pianist who was wife to composer Robert Schumann, had a house here.
Hector Berlioz composed and debuted an opera in the Theatre, modeled on the Paris Opera. Dosteyevsky and Turgenev spent time in this green and walkable town, with its impeccable 19th century neo-classic buildings, flowering trees, museums, shops and public gardens. On one side, the river Oos and the town of shops, restaurants and steepled churches. On the other side, acres of grass, trees and flowers. It is also where the hero walks, head down, pondering his doomed love.
Yet the town is about the present as well as the past. The Frieder Burda Museum is a modern concrete and glass building that manages to fit right into the landscape. Designed by New York architect, Richard Meier, the museum houses over works of modern art, with rotating exhibits of major international artists. A free summer concert fueled by plenty of food and drink attracts locals and tourists alike to the lawn in front of the Kurhaus.
In front is an elegant outdoor cafe. Beyond it there is plenty of space for music festivals and the Christmas market, for this is an all-season destination, with dramatic foliage in the fall, followed by cross-country skiing and cozy fireplaces in winter. The Kurhaus has an indoor performance space, and so the sound track of my first day was the music of Brahms and Bruckner, courtesy of a free afternoon performance by the Baden-Baden Philharmonic.
