August-Bebel-Strasse is the main shopping street in Werdau, Saxony. It runs for a good 500 metres in a north-south direction from Werdau Markt to Tuchfabrik Werdau, where it merges into Plauensche Straße. It runs largely parallel to the River Pleiße, in the valley of which the town centre of Werdau lies. In our panorama, we see a street block on the east side between Ziegelstraße on the left and Pestalozzistraße on the right. At the junction of Pestalozzistraße on the opposite side of the street is the Annoncenuhr historical and technical monument.
Architectural styles and shopping street
This street is characterised by different façade styles. The smaller houses are reminiscent of the two-storey buildings of the early industrialised, former farming town. The subsequent industrialisation brought an enormous upswing and increase in prosperity to western Saxony, and the town centre of Werdau was accordingly rebuilt in Wilhelminian architectural styles up to reform architecture, recognisable here, for example, by decorative half-timbered elements. While the post-reunification period meant significant problems for a former industrial town like Werdau, and also a decline of the shopping street, you can still find some of the traditional local traders here, such as Café Capri, the Central pharmacy, the optician Steinert and the fashion shop Jeans Live. The passageway in the half-timbered building was once the side exit of the former (Art Decó) Central Cinema behind it, whose main entrance is on Ziegelstraße.
In this area of August-Bebel-Strasse, you can see a noticeable widening of the street – this indicates that the Werdau Anger, and thus the nucleus of the Werdau settlement, was once located here. It was only later that the town centre shifted northwards to today’s market, with the town hall and the town church.
