Explore Rostock

The Abbey of the Holy Cross is a Brick Gothic former Cistercian nunnery founded in 1270 by the Danish queen Margaret Sambiria, with its church completed in 1360. After the Reformation it continued as a Lutheran women's convent until 1920; the church now serves as the university church, and the convent buildings house Rostock's Cultural History Museum.

St. Mary's Church is a Brick Gothic basilica in Rostock's old town, first mentioned in 1232 and enlarged into its present cross-shaped form by the late 14th century; its baroque tower lantern was finished in the 18th century. Inside stand a medieval astronomical clock, a 1770 organ with 83 stops, a 1721 gilded high altar and a 1574 pulpit.

St. Peter's Church is a Brick Gothic basilica in Rostock's old town, rebuilt as a three-nave church in the mid-14th century on a site used since around 1300. Its 117-metre spire, the tallest of the city's former four main churches, was rebuilt after wartime damage and carries a viewing platform reached by 195 steps or a lift.

Rostock Zoo opened in 1899 as the Hirschgarten an der Trotzenburg and today covers 56 hectares with around 4,500 animals from 320 species. It has been the European studbook keeper for polar bears since 1980, and its Darwineum, opened in 2012, houses gibbons, gorillas and orangutans in a 20,000-square-metre hall.

Kunsthalle Rostock is a museum of contemporary art that opened in 1969 beside the Schwanenteich lake in the Reutershagen district, built during the East German period as a dedicated exhibition hall for contemporary painting, sculpture, photography and prints. It has shown work by artists including Georg Baselitz, Gerhard Richter and Robert Rauschenberg.

Warnemünde Church is a neo-Gothic brick church built between 1866 and 1871 to a cross-shaped plan by architect Theodor Krüger, with rose windows in its transept gables. It holds a carved Gothic altar from 1475, a 1591 Renaissance pulpit, and a 3.72-metre oak figure of Saint Christopher from around 1500.

The Warnemünde Lighthouse is a 36.9-metre lighthouse on the Baltic coast, built between 1897 and 1898 on 33 pillars driven 11 metres into the sand and faced in glazed white brick with green bands. A granite spiral staircase leads to two galleries; the light, automated since 1978, has a range of about 20 nautical miles.