Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf began as a small settlement at the mouth of the Düssel, a stream that enters the Rhine here. A lowland castle was built on the riverbank in 1260, and on 14 August 1288, after the Battle of Worringen, Count Adolf VIII of Berg granted the village town privileges. Under the Dukes of Berg it grew into a regional political and cultural centre and then the capital of the United Duchies of Jülich-Cleves-Berg. Its golden age came under the Elector Johann Wilhelm II, known as Jan Wellem, and his wife Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, whose patronage gave the city its first significant cultural flowering in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

Napoleon made Berg a grand duchy with Düsseldorf as its capital, and visited the city in November 1811, but the wars left it poor, and in 1815 it passed to Prussia. It lost its status as a capital but became the seat of a regional government and of the Rhenish provincial diet. Industry then transformed it: the population grew from 40,000 in 1850 to 100,000 in 1882. Allied bombing devastated the city in the Second World War, above all in 1943, when more than 700 bombers attacked in a single night.

In 1946 the British occupiers made Düsseldorf capital of the new state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The population peaked at just over 705,000 in 1962. From the 1950s Japanese companies opened their European offices here, and by the 1980s the city had Germany's largest Japanese community. Since the late 20th century the old Rhine port has been redeveloped as the MedienHafen, and after decades of decline the population has been slowly rising again since the late 1990s.

Art is central to the city's image. The Kunstakademie Düsseldorf gave its name to the Düsseldorf School of painting in the 19th century and counts Joseph Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke and August Macke among its members. Heinrich Heine was born here in 1797, and the university bears his name; Robert and Clara Schumann and Felix Mendelssohn worked in the city. Kraftwerk made Düsseldorf a name in electronic and experimental music.

Carnival is the city's great festival, ranked behind only Cologne and Mainz in Germany, and the rivalry with Cologne, about 35 kilometres upstream, extends to the carnival cry — "Helau" here — football, ice hockey and beer. The Radschläger, boys turning cartwheels, are a city symbol, and a society founded in 1920 organised the first cartwheeling competition in 1937. Fortuna Düsseldorf plays at the Merkur Spiel-Arena, one of the venues of the 2024 European Championship.

Düsseldorf and its surroundings have the largest Japanese community in Germany, about 11,000 people, with a Japanese club founded in 1964, a Japanese school, a Japanese garden in the Nordpark, and, in Niederkassel, Europe's only Jōdo Shinshū Buddhist temple. Japan Day, held each spring, is Europe's largest festival of Japanese culture. The city is also markedly secular: by 2006 people who belonged to no religious community already formed the largest group.

About 620,000 people lived in the city at the end of 2025, making it Germany's seventh-largest, and it has grown together with neighbours such as Neuss, Ratingen, Krefeld and Meerbusch. Around a quarter of residents hold a foreign citizenship. Most of the city lies on the right bank of the Rhine; the left-bank quarters such as Oberkassel are among its most prosperous.

The economy is built on services: Düsseldorf is a business and financial centre, known for fashion, advertising and its trade fairs, and is home to the headquarters of Henkel, Rheinmetall, Metro and Uniper. Many Japanese banks and companies have their European headquarters here. Unemployment averaged 7.7 per cent in 2024. Heinrich Heine University, founded in 1965 on the base of a medical academy of 1907, has more than 36,000 students, and the city has 22 institutions of higher education in all.

The rhythm of the city follows the river. On fine evenings the Rhine promenade and the meadows on the left bank fill with people, and the old town's pubs and bars are busiest at weekends. Trade fairs fill hotels and trams for days at a time. In September 2025 Stephan Keller of the CDU was re-elected mayor.

Altbier is the city's drink: a copper-coloured, top-fermented beer, whose name was first used by the Schumacher brewery, opened in 1838, to set it apart from bottom-fermented beers. Five brewpubs still brew it on site — Füchschen, Schumacher, Zum Schlüssel, Uerige and Kürzer — and in the old town, with over 250 pubs and bars, it is served in 0.25-litre glasses. Killepitsch, a herbal liqueur, is the local spirit.

Brewpub menus keep the Rhenish classics. Rheinischer Sauerbraten is beef marinated in vinegar and served with a raisin-sweetened gravy; Düsseldorfer Senfrostbraten is steak roasted with the city's mustard and an onion crust; the Halve Hahn, despite its name, is not half a chicken but half a double rye roll with Gouda and mustard. Mustard is a local pride, and Löwensenf is one of the best-known brands.

The Japanese community has given the city a strong presence of authentic Asian cooking, with Japanese restaurants and shops around Immermannstraße alongside Chinese and Korean places. The Carlsplatz in Carlstadt, the oldest market square still in use in the city, holds a market six days a week with produce, meat, fish, baked goods and food stalls.