Description [EN]
On the edge of the Bockenheimer Anlage in Frankfurt am Main stands the Nebbiensche Gartenhaus, a Neoclassical pavilion protected as a cultural monument.
The building was erected in 1810, probably to a design for the publisher Marcus Johann Nebbien on the occasion of his third marriage. Nebbien had already acquired the plots Hochstraße 10–22 (then Hohe Strasse) in 1807 and had a residence built on plot number 18; the pavilion formed the northern boundary of this property. After 1840 two side wings were added to the central building; the main building has a basement. Due to the still applicable Wallservitut the former grounds of the Frankfurt city fortifications were not permitted to be built over, so only small garden houses were allowed.
After the death of the original owner the garden house passed into the ownership of the banker Philipp Bernhard Andreae; in 1867 he sold the property to the Prussian military treasury following the annexation of the Free City of Frankfurt. The Prussian army used the garden house at times as a mustering station for Frankfurt recruits. Later, after it passed into municipal ownership, the plot was incorporated into the public promenade of the Wallanlagen.
During the interwar period the Nebbiensche Gartenhaus served as a painter’s studio. The air raids in the Second World War left the building unscathed; of the approximately 250 garden houses that once existed it remained the only intact example. In 1952 a renovation was carried out with donated funds and the ornamental garden was newly laid out. Two fountains were installed at that time: the marble Florentine fountain, previously in the Villa Waldfried of the Frankfurt entrepreneur Carl von Weinberg, who had been persecuted by the National Socialists, and a small fountain made from a white sandstone capital with a wrought-iron fountain house.
Today the Nebbiensche Gartenhaus is used by the Frankfurter Künstlerclub e. V., which was founded in 1955 as the Club "Gebende Hände". The pavilion regularly hosts exhibitions by regional artists, matinées, poetry readings and concerts.