3 Best Sights in Augsburg, The Romantic Road

This museum, housed in a fine restored Renaissance building, is dedicated to two of the city's most influential benefactors, the Fugger and Welser families, whose banking and merchant empire brought Italian art and world artifacts along with wealth to Augsburg in the 15th to 18th centuries. Providing insight into how the families contributed to the city, the museum offers both a glimpse into life in the 15th century through the Industrial Revolution, and a hands-on lesson in Augsburg history.

Housed in a 1917 synagogue which escaped major damage on Kristallnacht (night of the broken glass) in 1938, it was restored in the 1990s both for religious services and as a cultural center for theater and concert performances; the glorious blue and gold domed ceiling provides excellent acoustics. The museum tells the story of centuries of Jewish life in Augsburg before WWII, including famous residents. Most notable is the Peter Lamfrom family, who was a shirtmaker in this textile town. The family escaped in 1938, winding up in Portland, Oregon, where he named his new clothing company after the local Columbia River. Daughter Gert (Gertrude) and her husband grew the business into the Columbia Sportswear Company.

Augsburg's main museum houses a permanent exhibition of Augsburg arts and crafts, including sculptures and gold and silver handicrafts, in a 16th-century merchant's mansion, focusing on the medieval, renaissance and industrial revolution periods when the city was one of the most wealthy and influential in Bavaria and Europe.