Florence on the Elbe or just Dresden!

Frauenkirche

When saying Dresden the first thing to come to my mind will always be Frauenkirche, which startled me with its beauty and history. This Baroque style church was completed in the 18th century. Unfortunately, it was intensively bombarded and destroyed during WWII. It was reconstructed after the unification of Germany and was reopened in 2005. The church is now topped with a gold cross, which is a present from Great Britain, which bombardment destroyed most of the church during the war.

Zwinger

Zwinger is an early 18th-century palace. It was commissioned by Augustus II, king of Poland and elector of Saxony, as a place for entertainments, tournaments, and royal festivities. Most of it was destroyed during WWII and was rebuilt in its original style. The time I was at Zwinger, most of it was under renovation and closed, but will be happy to revisit Dresden and Zwinger.

Brühl's Terrace

My heart filled with joy when I was promenading along Brühl's Terrace, which is also called “Balcony to Europe”. This was one of those strolls for me, when you observe the passers-by, think, laugh and enjoy the scenery. If you want to know more about the monuments near the Brühl's Terrace, please see here!

Dresden Kulturpalast

If I am not mistaken, I first saw this building in the German movie “Never look away” (“Werk ohne autor”) and I was really overjoyed to see it in reality. I didn’t have time to go inside the building, which is a beautifully preserved glimpse of GDR Dresden showing Soviet mural and the wall fresco. Now this building is a home to Dresden Philharmonic and Die Herkuleskeule cabaret theatre.

Furstenzag (Procession of Princes)

The Procession of Princes is a 102-meter-long portrait of Dukes, Kings, German artists and scientists, which was made in 1870 and consists of 25,000 Meissen Porcelain tiles. Read more about it here!

Interesting facts!

When I was walking through Dresden, I noticed that many buildings are black, as if they had been burnt. And I was wondering what had happened to them. When doing research on the internet, I have found the answer to my question. Soo.. Dresden has a lot of sandstone buildings. Sandstone naturally turns black as it ages and the buildings look like they were burned.

Yenidze

I was very surprised to see this mosque style building in Dresden and was even more surprised to find out its history. Yenidze is a former cigarette factory building in Dresden built between 1907-09. Today it is used as an office building.

The Yenidze Tobacco and Cigarette Factory was a tobacco company started by the Jewish entrepreneur Hugo Zietz, which imported tobacco from Ottoman Yenidze, Thrace (modern Genisea, Greece).

It has large, colored dome chimneys which resemble minarets. It was sometimes referred to as the "tobacco mosque" (German: Tabakmoschee), a term which is no longer officially used as the building is not a mosque. (Source- Wikipedia)

Places to get from Dresden!

Meissen

Only 30 km from Dresden is Meissen, which is famous for porcelain. The town is dominated by Albrechtsburg Castle (15th century) and Meissen Cathedral (13th century).

What was very interesting to observe were the early graves in the floor in huge stone slabs, which was the first time for me to see such gravestones in a European church, as we have lots of them in our Armenian apostolic churches․ That’s the reason the cathedral reminded me of Armenian churches and made me leave an Armenian prayer in the book of prayers at the Meissen cathedral.

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Let’s all our prayers reach God and peace be in the world!