The Secrets of
Frankfurt

Where Emperors Were Crowned and Democracy Was Born

This city has always punched above its weight. A free imperial city since the Middle Ages, Frankfurt crowned Holy Roman Emperors in its cathedral and gave birth to German democracy in its churches. Goethe wrote his first masterpieces here. The Rothschilds built their banking empire from its streets.

Then the bombs came. In March 1944, Allied raids destroyed nearly the entire medieval old town — one of the largest half-timbered districts in Europe, gone in a single night. But Frankfurt rebuilt. Today, glass towers rise beside painstakingly reconstructed half-timbered houses. The skyline locals call "Mainhattan" stands as proof: this city has always known how to start over.