Aphrodite Villingen-Schwenningen (D)

Villingen-Schwenningen

Name origin Villingen

ad Filingas (lat., = with the people of Filo, Vilmar)

Name origin Schwenningen

Suaninga (Germ., = with the people of Swano, Swanagèr) --> Swenlingen

First documented mention

817 AD

Population

86,000

Area

165.53 km²

Federal state

Baden-Württemberg

Administrative region

Freiburg

District

Schwarzwald-Baar-Kreis

Vehicle registration

VS

River

Brigach (Villingen), Neckar (Schwenningen)

The Club Aphrodite is located in Schwenningen.

The sentence "Villingen-Schwenningen is a backwater in the Black Forest where you wouldn't want to be caught dead hanging over a picket fence" is wrong, and for the following reasons: First, Villingen-Schwenningen is a twin city, made up of the Baden town of Villingen and the Württemberg town of Schwenningen. Second, Villingen-Schwenningen doesn't lie in the forest at all, but on a high plateau at 758 m above sea level between the Black Forest and the Swabian Alb, right along the European watershed. Third, these are two towns that can look back on a long history, which is reflected in each having a charming central promenade and even its own train station. Fourth, at the home of the Baden-Württemberg Police Academy, one shouldn't be hanging around picket fences dead or alive. And fifth, four different sauna clubs plus two Eros Centers currently keep pleasure-seekers in Villingen-Schwenningen thoroughly entertained.

Anyone travelling from Baden-Baden or Offenburg to Villingen on the Schwarzwaldbahn will, after an almost adventurous ride through numerous tunnels and gorges, be quite astonished to find that the town lies on a wide high plateau, the so-called Baar basin. Villingen-Schwenningen sits at 758 m above sea level, making it the highest-situated of all German towns with over 50,000 inhabitants. The town centres of Villingen and Schwenningen are about eight kilometres apart and connected by a country road. Local public transport between the two towns runs mainly via local buses, though there is also a direct rail connection via the southern loop of the regional tracks. While Villingen sits right on the eastern edge of the Black Forest massif, from Schwenningen further east you already look out onto the ridges of the Swabian Alb. Nearby, in Donaueschingen, the source of the Danube rises, while near Schwenningen, in the Schwenninger Moos, lies the source of the Neckar. The town's recreational value is obvious, since the two localities have two magnificent natural landscapes right on their doorstep, and a further natural paradise, namely Lake Constance, lies just around forty kilometres further south. One small drawback: Villingen-Schwenningen is considered the municipality with the highest hail risk in Germany.

The two towns merged into a twin city in 1972 and have different histories. Both are mentioned for the first time in a document by Louis the Pious in 817, but while Villingen was assigned to the Fürstenberg family in 1283 and belonged to Austria from 1326 to 1805, Schwenningen was assigned to the Oberamt Tuttlingen in 1444, from which it passed to the Oberamt Rottweil in 1842. Villingen still has a largely intact medieval town centre with several sights such as the early Gothic minster, the late Gothic town hall, and remnants of the town fortifications like the Bickentor, the Riettor, and the Pulvertürmle. Schwenningen was attacked by Villingen during the Peasants' War in 1525 and almost completely burned down, while Villingen itself had already been completely destroyed by a great fire in 1271.

Villingen today is home to, among others, Kienzle Apparate GmbH, which now belongs to Continental AG, as well as the music label HGBS. Villingen was also once the home base of the popular radio manufacturer SABA. In Schwenningen, a clock factory was founded by Johannes Bürk in 1858, and the town subsequently developed into a leading centre of clock manufacturing. Today the clock and time-recording companies Bürk, Eugen Trost, Kienzle, Mauthe, and ISGUS are based in the town. As one of the centres of Black Forest clock production, the town lies along the route of the German Clock Road.

The singer Michelle, the ski jumper Martin Schmitt, and the two football players Florian and Sebastian Rudy all come from Villingen-Schwenningen.