Goethe-Laboratorium
About This Site
The Goethe-Laboratorium is the University of Jena's permanent exhibition on Goethe as a natural scientist, set in the inspector's house of the Botanical Garden, where Goethe spent more than 350 days between 1817 and 1830.[1] He had the house rebuilt for Grand Duke Carl August's fiftieth jubilee in 1825 to plans by the architect Clemens Wenzeslaus Coudray: a three-winged group of yellow-plastered half-timbered buildings around a small, almost square courtyard, which Goethe inspected on its completion in 1827.[2] Memorial rooms opened here in 1921, and since 2024 the exhibition Bewegliche Ordnung presents Goethe's geology, anatomy and botany, with glimpses of his meteorology, palaeontology and theory of colour.[3][4]
Summer quarters in the garden, 1817–1822
At the end of May 1817 Goethe moved his summer quarters in Jena into the inspector's house of the Botanical Garden. The garden's director, Friedrich Siegmund Voigt, left him his official apartment in the oriel of the first floor, and Goethe moved the office of his supervision of the institutions for science and art there as well. The old house still had a cowshed, a washhouse and rooms for farm tools and stores on its ground floor. In what he called his seclusion on the mountain of flowers and plants, Goethe spent more than 300 days counting only 1817 and the years 1819 to 1822; in 1820 he stayed without a break from 31 May to 4 November, more than five months.[2] His office brought him to Jena regularly, and he used the house as a retreat, to enjoy easy company and refresh himself from academic life.[1]
A study like Faust's, 1817–1824
In the garden Goethe worked intensively across the fields of natural research and published his journal Zur Naturwissenschaft überhaupt, zur Morphologie insbesondere (1817–1824), while writing and working on science policy and the university's collections.[2] Visitors of the day compared his study to Faust's vaulted study: engravings, boxes of stones and parts of skeletons lay everywhere, among them two skulls from the nearby Johannisfriedhof, in a creative, almost chaotic order among piles of files and specimens.[1]
Guests in the garden apartment, 1820–1825
Goethe received scholars and guests of the university here, entertained Grand Duke Carl August more than once, and on one occasion Grand Duke Carl Friedrich and his wife Maria Pawlowna. In August 1820 two Berlin sculptors, Christian Daniel Rauch and Christian Friedrich Tieck, sat in the garden apartment at the same time, each modelling a bust of Goethe, then seventy-one.[2] When he received an honorary doctorate in November 1825, Goethe wrote that he truly owed the development of his scientific endeavours to this academy.[1]
Coudray's new house and the ginkgo, 1825–1827
For Carl August's fiftieth jubilee in office in September 1825, which also marked fifty years of Goethe's service in Weimar, the house was to be rebuilt to match the growing importance of the Botanical Garden, laid out in 1794; Goethe offered ideas and discussed the design with the court architect Coudray, and the inscription DEM III. Sept. MDCCCXXV on the east gable still recalls the occasion.[1] The old house was pulled down to its foundations and rebuilt on the same site to Coudray's plans, now with its front facing east into the garden; in October 1827 Goethe inspected the finished building.[2] The great ginkgo in the garden, more than 200 years old, was planted in Goethe's lifetime.[5]
The last night in the garden, June 1830
Goethe's last visit to Jena was in 1830, when he slept in the garden apartment on the night of 19 to 20 June. His diary for the evening records that he stopped at the Botanical Garden, took the oriel rooms and found everything in the best order; the next morning he went through the mineralogical and zoological museums in the palace before driving home to Weimar.[2] Counted from his first visit on 23 December 1775 to this last stay, his time in Jena adds up to more than five years, and the university town became a second home to him.[6]
Goethe rooms, memorial and laboratory, 1921–2024
Memorial rooms showing Goethe's world of living and working were set up in the house as early as 1921. Bombs destroyed parts of the north-east wing in 1945, and the rebuilding of 1947 to 1949 followed the old plans; after a thorough restoration from 2014 to 2024 the layout of the rooms is largely preserved.[1] The Goethe rooms of 1921 became the Goethe-Gedenkstätte in 1954 and the Goethe-Laboratorium in 2024.[3]
The exhibition Bewegliche Ordnung, since 2024
Curated by Helmut Hühn of Jena and Margrit Wyder of Zurich, the permanent exhibition brings the foundations of Goethe's study of nature to life and explores the sciences and their history at the same time.[7] By the entrance hangs Heinrich Christoph Kolbe's life-size portrait of Goethe in an Italian landscape with Vesuvius behind him, painted between 1822 and 1826 and given to the university in 1831. The geology room shows a granite slab from the Harz, the rock Goethe loved best, and the certificate by which the Jena Mineralogical Society made the philosopher Hegel an honorary assessor in 1804; Goethe had become the society's president in 1803.[5]
Visiting, today
The Goethe-Laboratorium is open Wednesday to Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm and is entered from Fürstengraben only, not from the Botanical Garden; combined tickets cover the Botanical Garden or Schiller's Garden House as well. Guided tours for groups of up to twelve can be booked all year, in German and in English, with Tuesdays suggested outside the regular hours.[8]
Questions visitors ask
- How much time did Goethe spend in the inspector's house?
- More than 350 days between 1817 and 1830; in 1820 alone he stayed from 31 May to 4 November without a break.[1][2]
- Who built the house that stands today?
- Clemens Wenzeslaus Coudray, the Weimar court architect, who rebuilt it for Carl August's jubilee of 1825 with Goethe's ideas; Goethe inspected the finished three-winged house in October 1827.[1][2]
- What does the Goethe-Laboratorium show?
- Goethe's natural science: geology, anatomy and botany above all, with his meteorology, palaeontology and theory of colour shown through selected objects, and Kolbe's life-size portrait of Goethe at the entrance.[4][5]
- Is the Goethe-Laboratorium the former Goethe-Gedenkstätte?
- Yes. The Goethe rooms set up in the inspector's house in 1921 became the Goethe-Gedenkstätte in 1954 and have been the Goethe-Laboratorium since 2024.[3]
Connected Historical Figures
writer • statesman • naturalist
Goethe spent more than 350 days here between 1817 and 1830, ran his supervision of the duchy's scientific institutions from the house and had it rebuilt in 1825–1827; the exhibition inside is devoted to his natural science.
architect • Oberbaudirektor
Coudray designed the new inspector's house, discussed with Goethe and built on the old site in 1825–1827 as a three-winged group around a small courtyard.
duke • grand duke • patron
The house was rebuilt for his fiftieth jubilee in office in 1825, recorded on the east gable, and Goethe entertained him here more than once.
grand duchess • patron
Goethe once received her and Grand Duke Carl Friedrich in his garden apartment in the inspector's house.
Sources (8)
- Inspektorhaus des Botanischen Gartens — Kulturdenkmale in Jena (JenaKultur), retrieved 13 September 2026
- Goethe im Inspektorhaus des Botanischen Gartens 1817–1830 — Goethe-Laboratorium, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Metamorphosen des Ausstellens im Inspektorhaus — Goethe-Laboratorium, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Goethe-Laboratorium — JenaKultur / Visit Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Rundgang durch die Ausstellung — Goethe-Laboratorium, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Goethe und Jena — Goethe-Laboratorium, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Goethe-Laboratorium — Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
- Besuch und Rundgang — Goethe-Laboratorium, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, retrieved 13 September 2026
Visit Information
3 euros, reduced 2 euros; children under 10 and students of the University of Jena free. Combined tickets: with the Botanical Garden 6 euros, with Schiller's Garden House 5 euros.
Wednesday to Sunday 11:00–17:00; closed on public holidays. Entrance from Fürstengraben only.
Fürstengraben 26, 07743 Jena
In the history of Jena
Historic sites
Fürstengraben 26, 07743 Jena
The inspector's house stands in the Botanical Garden, with its front turned towards the garden since Coudray's rebuilding; the entrance to the exhibition is on Fürstengraben, and a combined ticket covers both.
Around Weimar
19 km East
The inspector's house of the Botanical Garden, Goethe's Jena quarters from 1817 to 1830 and the university's Goethe exhibition since 2024.