One of the world's most significant photo-historical collections — nearly 20,000 cameras and over 12,000 photographs, now housed at Museum Ludwig in Cologne.
Listed Brutalist church from 1968 with a striking tetrahedral form, now operating as the 'Kulturkirche Ost' cultural venue for readings, music, and cabaret.
Catholic University of Applied Sciences North Rhine-Westphalia
since 1971
★★★★★★★★★★3.5(61)· Google
Church-affiliated university of applied sciences for social work and healthcare professions, sponsored by four dioceses across Aachen, Cologne, Münster, and Paderborn.
Multiplex cinema in Cologne's Mediapark — beneath the dome of its glazed rotunda, 3,200 diodes once traced the northern night sky.
Cinema at Hohenzollernring 22
★★★★★★★★★★4.5(3,697)· Google
A cinema on Hohenzollernring in Cologne – with a classic movie-theatre feel, solid picture and sound, and a snack selection that includes vegan options.
Family-run cinema in the heart of Cologne's Ehrenfeld district – with a bar, bistro, beer garden, and a programme ranging from original-language screenings to Pram Cinema.
Among surviving cathedral libraries, considered the most significant — the Archdiocese of Cologne's central library, with roots in the 6th/7th century.
Filmforum NRW
★★★★★★★★★★4.6(148)· Google
Repertory and community cinema in the Museum Ludwig by Cologne Cathedral.
Hub for film culture combining a deliberately non-commercial cinema, film education, and professional training — housed in a former freight depot building from 1891.
Filmpalette
★★★★★★★★★★4.4(460)· Google
Two-screen art-house cinema in Cologne's Eigelstein quarter near Ebertplatz – art-house films and subtitled original versions, honoured with the BKM top prize.
Research and documentation centre for dance in the Mediapark – combining an archive, library, video collection and museum tracing the history of stage dance.
Germania Judaica
since 1959
Europe's most extensive specialist library on the history of German-speaking Jewry — founded in Cologne in 1959 with Heinrich Böll among its founders.
Cologne's grand late-Gothic festival hall from the 15th century — home to carnival sessions, congresses, concerts, and the annual proclamation of the Cologne Carnival Trio.
French cultural institute in Cologne's Südstadt — one of the first and now one of the last of its kind in western Germany; housed in Riphahn's 1952 building.
In 1953 this stage hosted Germany's first live TV broadcast of a theatre play — the Millowitsch family's dialect theatre, now the Volksbühne am Rudolfplatz.
Musical venue under a blue dome roof by the Rhine near Cologne's main station — home to long-running hits like 'We Will Rock You'.
ODEON Lichtspieltheater
★★★★★★★★★★4.7(920)· Google
Arthouse cinema in Cologne with a rotating film programme, its own café & beer garden, and a dedicated cinema day every Thursday.
OFF Broadway
★★★★★★★★★★4.6(752)· Google
The OFF Broadway on Zülpicher Straße is a Cologne arthouse cinema with two screens, showing international film art and independent movies – preferably in the original version with subtitles.
The theatre square in Cologne's Altstadt-Nord, fronting the Opera House and Schauspielhaus, centred on the long-neglected Opernbrunnen by Jürgen Hans Grümmer.
Open-Air Cinema Cologne
★★★★★★★★★★4.1(734)· Google
Movies under the open sky at Cologne's harbour – doors open from 7 pm, and the film rolls once true darkness falls.
OPEN-AIR KINO Köln Ehrenfeld
★★★★★★★★★★4.7(9)· Google
Open-air cinema of the Cinenova arthouse cinema: current films under the open sky in summer in Cologne-Ehrenfeld.
One of Cologne's twelve great Romanesque churches — known for its trefoil-shaped trichoral apse at Neumarkt and celebrated as the city's premier music church.
One of Germany's largest public libraries with around 850,000 items — currently operating from a temporary location on Hohe Straße during major renovations.
The oldest newly built Protestant church on Cologne's left bank of the Rhine — a classicist basilica inspired by northern Italian models.
TtE-Bücherei
★★★★★★★★★★5.0(1)· Google
Freely accessible library and archive of left-wing social movements at the Alte Feuerwache — holding citizens' initiative journals and a substantial collection of grey literature.
TURISTARAMA
★★★★★★★★★★4.5(90)· Google
Cinema, concert and cultural venue on Mauritiussteinweg in Cologne, also rentable as an event hall.
Cologne's first neighbourhood theatre, founded in 1985 in a former Ehrenfeld cinema — with a series of operators across the decades.
Weisshaus Kino
★★★★★★★★★★4.5(588)· Google
Award-winning arthouse cinema in Cologne-Lindenthal showing European film art, international narrative cinema and its own strand of children's films – housed in a 1950s theatre building.
Germany's central specialist library for medicine, health, nutrition, environment and agricultural sciences — with its main campus in Cologne-Lindenthal.
The university library of the Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln — reportedly the world's largest specialized library dedicated to sport and sports science.
Deconsecrated orphanage church in Cologne-Sülz by Dominikus and Gottfried Böhm — featuring a 'children's orchestra' of 128 octagonal stained-glass windows.
