Dortmund is a city located in Germany – on the west coast so very close to France and easily accessible via Thalys train company. It’s only a 4h train journey from Paris and once there you are in a totally different environment. Why? Dortmund used to be a very big industrial city famous for coal and steel production 20 years ago. Since then, almost all factories closed down and they’ve been abandoned. Nature always wins so when visiting theses factories, we were amazed by how fast nature can grow in this environment… Dortmund is the 8th biggest city in Germany with 580 thousands inhabitants.
On top of being an industrial area, Dortmund is also a green city with an average of 50% of its territory covered with forest, and other green spaces.
This was our second visit in Germany, first was in Berlin 5 years ago. You can read here – on my Travel Blog « Rêver d’Ailleurs » – my 10 good reasons to fly to Berlin (in French), and read all my articles here.
End of September, we’ve been invited to discover Dortmund and to wander around this not very well-know city – well on a tourism point of view. We were very happy as we are huge fan of abandoned places! Always fascinating.
We had not a lot of free time during this trip so only a very few chance to walk around arty areas… but sill we found some great artwork located in the first pipeline we visited. Indeed, we have been on a skywalk of an old pipeline and the space has been invaded by artists somehow.
Skywalk mit Hochofenaufstieg
www.skywalk-dortmund.de
And then randomly on the streets, in the city center:
And the biggest and the best for the end, Blek le Rat – the artwork has even been protected to make sure it will last forever! Our first piece of this artist on the street. Amazing!
If you’re more interested in the city, I wrote my 10 good reasons to fly to Dortmund (in French) that you can read on my Travel Blog « Rêver d’Ailleurs ». Enjoy and don’t hesitate if you have any questions on this trip!
Do you like abandoned places?
