Klösterle

The Klösterle is a half-timbered house built around 1465 in Bad Cannstatt, now part of Stuttgart. It stands on Thaddäus-Troll-Platz in the market street, near the edge of the old town centre. The building is the oldest surviving secular house in Stuttgart, with parts of its roof frame dating from 1463. A small Gothic chapel is built into the first floor, and an oriel window was added in 1476. A Renaissance stucco ceiling was installed in the chapel in 1576, while the adjoining barn-like structure was built as a service wing about 1580. The house’s name suggests it may once have housed a community of Beginen, lay religious women who lived without formal vows. Tax records list various private owners, but no convent appears in the documents. One owner around 1576 may have inherited the house from a mother who had been a Begine, so the chapel could be the only surviving house chapel of a Beginen community. The building narrowly escaped demolition in the 1970s thanks to a local campaign, and was carefully restored in 1983. Today the ground floor houses a wine tavern, while the upper floor is an architect’s office. Next door, in the old service wing, the Cannstatt city museum displays local history. Visitors can see the Gothic chapel with its 16th-century stucco ceiling and the original timber roof frame. The medieval market street outside and the nearby old town centre add to the historic atmosphere of the site.