Hohenstaufenbad

In the 19th century, municipal bathhouses served a vital hygienic purpose: as late as 1883, only 3% of Cologne's homes had a bath. City architect Josef Stübben commissioned the firm de Voss & Alfred Müller in March 1883 to design and build the complex. To fund it, the AG Hohenstaufenbad was incorporated on 12 May 1883 with capital of 600,000 marks, and operated the baths after opening. The complex occupied an entire city block between the ring road, Badstraße (now Schaevenstraße), Mauritiuswall, and Rubensstraße.

The street-facing main building was a two-storey rectangular block with a tall base, two single-bay side wings, and a three-bay central projection. Its street façade featured a flight of steps, a triple-arched entrance, and an open loggia on the first floor. The structure was built in brick with dressed stonework detailing.

The bathhouse catered to the prosperous middle classes and introduced a new bathing culture in the tradition of Roman thermae, at a time when most residents had relied on bathing establishments along the Rhine. When the operation proved financially unviable, the City of Cologne took over the company in 1887 and assumed full management in 1889. On 27 March 1913, a child named Elly Grünheck was welcomed as the millionth visitor; in 1916 alone, the baths recorded 316,576 individual bathing sessions.

An air raid on 30 June 1943 gutted the Hohenstaufenbad by fire, but the structure itself survived — windows were even replaced after the war. Post-war reconstruction planners dismissed Wilhelmine-era buildings as unworthy of preservation and used even minor damage as grounds for demolition. The Hohenstaufenbad was cleared by 1958, alongside other salvageable ruins such as the old Cologne Opera House, the City Hall, the main railway station, the neo-Gothic Gürzenich staircase, and the towers of the Hohenzollern Bridge.