Museum Werdenfels

Located in the heart of Garmisch-Partenkirchen’s old town, the Museum Werdenfels presents the cultural development of the Werdenfelser Land and is housed in a listed historic building.

The origins of the institution date back to 1895, when a collection of patterns and antiquities was assembled at the vocational school for woodcarving to preserve instructional material for craft training. The collection was expanded over the decades and was opened to the public for the first time in 1925; at that time a society of local patrons also began supporting the institution. In 1973 the local history museum, by then holding well over 3,000 objects, moved into the historic house Zum Schlampp on Ludwigstraße, known as the Wackerlehaus and dating from the 17th century. A rear annex adjoins the building; its upper floors were reconstructed in 2016–2018 and connected to a supplementary outbuilding. After renovation work, the museum reopened in 2019 under the name Museum Werdenfels.

The permanent exhibition extends across 15 rooms in the historic Wackerlehaus and begins in the Fasnacht Room with a collection of carved masks. On the first floor three rooms present rural and bourgeois living environments from the 16th to the 19th century; on display are, among other items, a canopy bed from 1583, a farmhouse parlor with a tiled stove, a Bankheber and a Herrgottswinkel, as well as a smoke kitchen with stove and cooking equipment. This is complemented by traditional costumes, a small painting gallery with works of the Munich School, and on the second floor the figure of Maria Immaculata by Ignaz Günther, which is carried annually in the Corpus Christi procession. Also shown are religious folk art, furniture painted in the Tölzer style, Oberammergau woodcarvings and a Mittenwald violin-making workshop; in the attic are displayed peasant tools and workshops.

The rear building houses temporary exhibition rooms, a gallery bridge with panoramic views of the Wetterstein mountain range and the Zugspitze Room, laid out as an experience area. The exhibition there provides information on mining in the Höllental mine up to 1925, the construction of the Bayerische Zugspitzbahn in 1928–1930, the beginnings of mountain tourism, the building of mountain huts and well-known Werdenfelser mountain guides. Also on display is the historic summit cross from 1851, whose faithful 1993 replica is part of the Heimatschätze Bayerns, designated as regionally typical.