Stuttgart's palaces get most of the attention, but the city has plenty to show beyond them. This guide covers five quite different places: the Stiftskirche, the Staatsgalerie art museum, the Kaiser Wilhelm monument on the Karlsplatz, the beer garden in the Schlossgarten and, a short ride east of the centre, a museum devoted entirely to pigs. Four of them lie on our scavenger hunt route, and the fifth is an easy extra for an afternoon.
Stiftskirche
The Stiftskirche, with its two unmatched towers, is the main church of the Protestant Church in Württemberg. Its story begins with a small Romanesque church of the 10th or 11th century; around 1240 it became a church with three aisles. The Gothic choir was built in the first half of the 14th century, and from 1436 Hänslin Jörg began the late Gothic nave, which his son Aberlin Jörg completed towards the end of the 15th century. The west tower, about 61 metres high, was built from around 1490 to 1531; the Reformation stopped the work, which is why it ends in a flat top instead of the planned spire.
Bombing in July and September 1944 destroyed the choir and the nave, and the post-war rebuilding gave the church a dark wooden barrel vault that many people disliked. From 1999 the architect Bernhard Hirche redesigned the interior with a new ceiling that recalls the old net vaulting, and the church reopened on 13 July 2003. The Stiftskirche is one of the stops of our scavenger hunt.
- The lower part of the south tower, the only structure in Stuttgart surviving from the Staufer period.
- The eleven statues of Württemberg counts on the north wall of the choir, commissioned by Duke Ludwig from the sculptor Sem Schlör in 1574; each count stands on a lion.
- The labyrinth windows by Johannes Schreiter from 1958, made after the war had destroyed all the old glass.
Staatsgalerie Stuttgart
The Staatsgalerie is the state art museum of Baden-Württemberg, and its buildings are as much a reason to come as its collection. King Wilhelm I of Württemberg founded it, and the classical old building by Gottlob Georg Barth opened in 1843. Next to it stands the Neue Staatsgalerie by James Stirling and Michael Wilford, opened on 9 March 1984. Its travertine and sandstone walls, bright green window frames, colourful steel beams and pink and blue handrails caused a stir at first; today it counts as one of the major works of postmodern architecture in Germany.
The collection holds about 5,000 paintings and sculptures, plus a print room with more than 400,000 works on paper. It runs from early German altarpieces through Dutch painting, with works by Rembrandt and Frans Hals, to Caspar David Friedrich, the French Impressionists, Picasso, Paul Klee and Max Beckmann. The museum plans to close from 2028 for several years of energy renovation, with modern works moving to the Kunstgebäude in the meantime, so check before you go if you visit later. The Staatsgalerie is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- Hans Holbein the Elder's Grey Passion and Jerg Ratgeb's Herrenberg Altarpiece among the early German paintings.
- The pink and blue handrails and green window frames of the Stirling building, which you can see from outside before you even go in.
- The contrast between Barth's columned old building of the 1840s and Stirling's extension right beside it.
Kaiser-Wilhelm-Denkmal
On the Karlsplatz, a short walk from the Old Castle, an emperor on horseback rides above a granite terrace. The monument shows Wilhelm I, King of Prussia and German Emperor, and was unveiled on 1 October 1898, ten years after his death. The sculptor was Wilhelm von Rümann and the architect Friedrich von Thiersch designed the base, both professors in Munich. Do not confuse him with King Wilhelm I of Württemberg, whose jubilee is marked by the column on the Schlossplatz: two different Wilhelms, two very different monuments.
The square itself began as a walled private garden of the duchess, first mentioned in 1393. Duke Karl Eugen opened it as a public promenade in 1778, and after his death in 1793 it was named Karlsplatz after him. A flea market has been held here on Saturdays since 1983. Close by stands the Hotel Silber, the Gestapo headquarters for Stuttgart during the Nazi period, from where the deportations of Württemberg's Jews were organised; the building was kept when the area was redeveloped. The Kaiser-Wilhelm-Denkmal is one of our scavenger hunt stops.
- The two resting lions flanking the steps at the front of the terrace.
- The granite obelisks behind the rider, part of Thiersch's design for the base.
Biergarten im Schlossgarten
The Schlossgarten is the long park that runs from the New Palace towards the Neckar, covering 64 hectares. Its oldest records go back to a count's garden beside the Old Castle mentioned in 1350, and the public royal gardens were laid out around 1800 and in the following years to plans by Nikolaus Friedrich von Thouret. The park has three parts, the upper, middle and lower Schlossgarten, divided by roads that you cross on footbridges.
The beer garden lies in the middle Schlossgarten and is the first stop of our scavenger hunt, so many players start the game here with a drink under the trees. Be aware that the huge Stuttgart 21 rail project has turned part of the middle park into a building site since 2010, so some paths may be fenced off or diverted.
- The Anlagensee, a lake that, like the beer garden, lies in the middle Schlossgarten.
- The ruin of the Neues Lusthaus, a Renaissance pleasure house whose remains now stand in the park, and the Carl Zeiss Planetarium nearby.
Schweinemuseum
The Schweinemuseum, the pig museum, is Stuttgart's most unusual collection. The restaurateur Erika Wilhelmer started it in 1989 in Bad Wimpfen, and in 2010 it moved to Stuttgart-Gaisburg, into the Jugendstil administration building of the city's former slaughterhouse, completed in 1912 to designs by Albert Pantle. By the 2010s it held more than 50,000 objects across almost 30 themed rooms, from lucky pigs and piggy banks to pigs in art, advertising and history. It is not on our scavenger hunt route, but it makes a fun extra trip east of the centre.
- The slaughterhouse building itself, a reminder of what the site was used for before the pigs here became exhibits.
- The rooms on lucky pigs, a symbol of good fortune in German-speaking countries, and on the piggy bank.
How to see them in one walk
Start at the beer garden in the middle Schlossgarten and walk up through the upper park towards the Staatsgalerie on Konrad-Adenauer-Straße. From there cross back into the centre past the New Palace and the Old Castle to the Karlsplatz and the Kaiser Wilhelm monument, then continue to the Schillerplatz and the Stiftskirche. Keep the Schweinemuseum in Gaisburg for a separate trip by public transport.
See Stuttgart with World City Trail
Our Stuttgart scavenger hunt turns the city centre into a game you play on your phone. The route links 10 stops, from the beer garden in the Schlossgarten to the Hans im Glück fountain. Four places in this guide are stops: the beer garden, the Staatsgalerie, the Stiftskirche and the Kaiser Wilhelm monument. The route also takes in the Schlossplatz, the New Palace, the Old Castle and the Marktplatz; the Schweinemuseum is not on it.
If you prefer a different format, there is also a self-guided walking tour and an outdoor escape game in Stuttgart.
Play the Stuttgart scavenger hunt →
Take the self-guided walking tour of Stuttgart →
Play the outdoor escape game in Stuttgart →
Facts checked in October 2026.