Hachenburg

Hachenburg puts central bankers in a Baroque castle. The Westerwald residence town's ensemble — the Schloss of the counts of Sayn-Hachenburg, rebuilt in warm Baroque after fire — today houses the Deutsche Bundesbank's university of applied sciences. The Alter Markt is among the Westerwald's prettiest squares: half-timber and slate around the lion fountain, the Catholic and Protestant churches bracketing the scene, cafés doing brisk trade — a market town's confidence rebuilt after its own historic fires. Beer belongs to the identity: the Westerwald-Brauerei has brewed Hachenburger here since the nineteenth century, its pils the region's pour and its brewery tours a local rite; the Landschaftsmuseum's assembled Westerwald houses keep the rural past in original timber. The spiritual counterweight lies in the Nister valley below: Marienstatt Abbey, the Cistercians' early-Gothic basilica — one of the style's purest works in the Rhineland — with living monastery, celebrated organ and church-music tradition, pilgrimage days and a monastic brewery garden by the river, all reached by a wooded walk from town. Money in the castle, beer in the cellars, plainchant in the valley: Hachenburg balances its accounts with Westerwald character.