Wuppertal

Wuppertal is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, along the narrow valley of the Wupper River. Its suspension railway, the Schwebebahn, has carried passengers in cars hanging from a steel track above the river since 1901.

Elberfeld and Barmen, the towns of the valley, grew from the 16th century on the bleaching of linen yarn in the soft water of the Wupper, and later on weaving, dyeing and ribbon making. Friedrich Engels was born in Barmen into a family of textile manufacturers. The valley towns merged in 1929, and the new city took the name Wuppertal a year later. Bayer began in Barmen as the dye works of Friedrich Bayer, and Felix Hoffmann first made pure aspirin in its laboratories in Elberfeld.

Bayer still runs pharmaceutical research and production at its Elberfeld site. Vorwerk, a family company based in Wuppertal, sells its Thermomix kitchen machines and Kobold vacuum cleaners door to door. Knipex makes pliers and wire cutters in the Cronenberg district.

The Tanztheater Wuppertal, led by Pina Bausch from the 1970s, changed modern dance with pieces such as Café Müller and The Rite of Spring. The Von der Heydt Museum, named after a family of local bankers who gave it their collection, holds paintings by Monet, Picasso and the German expressionists. The Engels House, the home of his family in Barmen, now holds a museum of his life beside a former textile mill.