A small neighbourhood and an urban experimental lab, an eternal insider tip and a place of longing for all those who don’t quite fit with the chic crowd: Westend is a place that keeps evolving without losing its original character.
The legendary carnival episode of the series “Monaco Franze” (1982), tells how the protagonist’s flirting efforts after a wild party at the Donnersberger Hof pub pay off. He walks home with his childhood crush, Lilly, where he is suddenly confronted with a precarious reality: Lilly paying the grumpy old babysitter, baby bottles and glasses scattered everywhere and the apartment consisting of just one room. Naturally, the single mother lives in Munich’s Westend – or, as people used to say (and some older folks still do): “on” Schwanthalerhöhe.
This is also where the protagonist, the son of a seamstress from Kazmairstraße, spent his youth, before his charm helped him advance into the upper-class circles of Lehel. The protagonist says goodbye – quietly and somewhat embarrassed – trying to avoid facing his own past too closely. Everyone who watched the series in the 1980s knows: Monaco is part of Munich's working-class neighbourhood or, to call it by its proper name – the Glasscherbenviertel (broken glass district).
Today, Westend is seen as different, as particularly genuine and cool, with more shared flats than elsewhere and livelier streets in the evenings than in other neighbourhoods. This is due to the fact that, until recently, Westend was the only real working-class district in Munich. Nowadays this is considered trendy and there are plenty of contenders for such a title: Sendling, Giesing, the Au, the Glockenbachviertel, even Haidhausen and Maxvorstadt. Since Munich largely remained a bourgeois city well into the 20th century, there is some truth in that. But compared to Schwanthalerhöhe, all the mentioned neighbourhoods seem grand. Because until the late 1990s, Schwanthalerhöhe was a neighbourhood of the ordinary people.
This is particularly evident in the architecture. Only in the Westend would a building like the Ledigenwohnheim (single people’s quarters), built by architect and urban planner Theodor Fischer on Gollierplatz in 1927, be imaginable. The austere brick building is one of the key examples of the Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) movement. Its small, simple rooms were – and still are – rented out to single men, mostly craftsmen, who could not afford anything larger.
Today, there are only two such “single people’s quarters” left in the whole of Europe. Another defining structure in Westend is the massive, somewhat outdated concrete complex that separates the district from the Theresienwiese (Oktoberfest grounds) to the east.
With its high-rise building and shopping centre, it looks like an alien spaceship that has landed in the middle of Munich – something you would expect to find far outside the Mittlerer Ring. Built in 1975, most of its small apartments are in the mid-price segment. By that time, the gentrification process in Munich’s central neighbourhoods had long begun – but not in Westend.
Westend also has an unusually high number of cooperative housing projects, most of which were built in the 1920s and 1960s. As a result, the area has a very dense feel, with narrow streets, many small craft businesses and even factories. The most significant of these is, of course, the Augustiner-Brewery. Since 1857, it has been housed on Landsberger Strasse in an imposing brick building, which gives the northern part of Westend an industrial charm that is almost reminiscent of Manchester.
As is well known, Augustiner is the only brewery in Munich that still brews on a large scale within the city limits and also malts its own beer. You can tell by the smell! Several times a week, Westend carries a distinct, sweet scent. If that doesn’t immediately make you crave a Halbe (half a litre) of beer at Augustiner Bräu, you’re probably in the wrong neighbourhood.
It’s quite fitting that Westend is bordered to the east by the Theresienwiese. The festival grounds are practically the terrace of the neighbourhood. Twice a year, the pneumatic hissing and sirens of the fairground rides echo across the entire Schwanthalerhöhe neighbourhood. However, the smaller of the two festivals, the Frühlingsfest (spring festival in April, is considered something like the inofficial Westend festival.
It is mainly attended by Munich locals – and most of them come from the neighbouring Westend. The beer tents at the spring festival are somewhat smaller than those at the Oktoberfest and a heartwarming sight in the early evening: Older couples often dance with beer-happy smiles in front of the pop bands. But then, long before closing time, you can see them slowly making their way up the ramp to Bavariaring circle, which separates the festival grounds from Westend.
Right next to it, behind the Ruhmeshalle (Hall of Fame) on the Theresienwiese, Westend has undergone a remarkable transformation in recent decades. The grounds of the Alte Messe trade fair centre have been turned into a spacious leisure area, complete with the Deutsches Museum Verkehrszentrum (transport museum), generous open spaces, playgrounds for children and a sports ground for youngsters. The vastness of the site and its diversity – with meadows to relax on, a beer garden to quench your thirst and large tarmac areas for skating or rollerblading – gives an openness to the area - in the truest sense of the word. There really is something for everyone here.
This is where the famous ‘Endless Staircase’ by star artist Olafur Eliasson, one of the most spectacular works of public art in Munich, is located and nearby, at the south-eastern tip of Schwanthalerhöhe, bright blocks of flats for families have been built. It is tidy, quiet and tranquil. At the same time, Westend has caught up with international urban standards: There are now numerous cafés serving flat whites, casual fine-dining restaurants with open kitchens and menus that list the ingredients with slashes, and cocktail bars whose entrances you can only find if you know where they are. In short: all the things that make people happy who know their way around Sydney, Lisbon or London.
All this gives Westend a new, upmarket vibe. Yet, it has managed to keep its original character. There are still pubs like the Kilombo on Gollierstrasse, where beer and left-wing cultural events blend in a very typical way, shaping the nightlife of the entire Westend. This is where all the neighbourhood's night owls flock together.
But perhaps the Westend, where it's easy to forget its central location in Munich once you're here, is in for a change. With big tech companies like Apple and Google moving into large offices just a short walk away across the Hackerbrücke, many young, well-travelled, wealthy people are coming to Munich. Many of them probably crave an urban, central life more than a lakeside property.
Westend could be perfectly situated for this crowd. And yet, the neighbourhood will probably remain what it has always been: a part of Munich that feels different from the rest of the city. It is very close to the city centre and yet somehow seems far away. The mix of small-scale structures and large blocks creates a strangely cosy atmosphere. In short: it's rough – and that's what makes it so warm-hearted.
