Things to do in Leipzig

Landmark · City centre

The church where the Monday prayers for peace grew into the demonstrations that ended the GDR in autumn 1989.

Local tip: The prayers still take place every Monday at five and are open to anyone. The interior — pale palm-tree columns added in the 1780s — is startling if you are expecting Lutheran austerity, and the single original column standing outside on the square is easy to walk past without knowing what it is.

Neighborhood · West of the centre

A nineteenth-century industrial quarter of brick factories and a canal, now the city's art and studio district.

Local tip: The Spinnerei was Europe's largest cotton mill and is now a complex of galleries and studios, home to the New Leipzig School painters. Galleries open together on set weekends several times a year — go then rather than on a random Tuesday when half the doors are locked.

Nature · 10–20 minutes south by tram or bike

Open-cast lignite pits flooded into a chain of lakes with beaches, sailing clubs and a marina, right at the edge of the city.

Local tip: Cospudener See is reachable by bicycle along the canal in half an hour and is where Leipzig swims all summer. Not every pit in the chain is finished — some are still filling and some banks are closed for stability reasons, so stick to the marked bathing areas rather than the interesting-looking shoreline.

Culture · City centre and Augustusplatz

The church where Bach was cantor for twenty-seven years and is buried, and one of the world's oldest civic orchestras.

Local tip: The Thomanerchor still sings motets on Friday evenings and Saturday afternoons, in the building the music was written for, for a very small entrance fee. It is the least touristic world-class thing in Germany and most residents never go.

Nightlife · Südvorstadt and Connewitz

'Karli' — two kilometres of bars, kebab shops, cinemas and beer gardens running south from the centre.

Local tip: The northern half is student and mainstream; keep going south into Connewitz for the alternative and left-wing scene the district is known for nationally. Cash still rules in a lot of these places, and several of the best ones do not take cards at all.

Food · Southeast of the centre

The oldest surviving terminus railway station building in the world, from 1842, now a brewpub making Gose on the premises.

Local tip: The portico is the actual 1842 structure, kept while the tracks beneath were rebuilt for the City Tunnel. Order the Gose with a shot of Allasch caraway liqueur, which is how it has been drunk here for two centuries, and sit in the beer garden under the arches.