Cobblestone mosaics (Freiburg im Breisgau)
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Cobblestone mosaics can be found throughout Freiburg im Breisgau. Most mosaics are embedded in the cobblestone pavement of the city centre of Freiburg.
These mosaics are commonly attributed to the paver Alois Krems, who lived in Freiburg in 1858. His work was inspired by pavings he had seen during his time as a wandering journeyman in southern France. In the late 19th century, major road reconstruction works took place in Freiburg, during which the Bächle were relocated from the centers to the edges of the roads. As a result, several roads in different parts of town (Wiehre, Herden, Neuburg) were repaved with cobblestone between 1901 and 1911. The new basalt pavements are streaked with veins of white marble. Furthermore, they feature the year in which they were constructed. Even though the bombing of Freiburg on 27 November 1944 destroyed about 38km of roads and pavements, many of the pavings survived and can still be admired today.
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The tradition of cobblestones enjoyed a revival during the 1970s when the old city of Freiburg was turned into a pedestrian zone. For instance, the pavements of Kaiser-Joseph-Straße, Freiburg's main shopping street, was paved with red porphyry and decorated with bands of white marble and smaller cobbles found in the Rhine. Larger cobblestones from the Rhine were also used to pave the Minster square. In 2012 a path leading to the main entrance of the minster was evened out so that the handicapped can access the church more easily.[1]
At the beginning of the Habsburgerstraße a mosaic on the pavement marks the course of the 48th parallel north.[2]
