On 29 September, Mayor Barbara Ludwig and project manager Ferenc Csák presented extracts from our bid book for the title of European Capital of Culture 2025 to hundreds of curious Chemnitz residents. Afterwards they chatted to visitors about the detail of the application.

It’s now almost exactly three years since we first thought out loud about a bid by Chemnitz to become European Capital of Culture 2025, and the idea immediately met with resounding support.
So off we set, heads held high, and along the way we had lots of discussions, a few doubts and even some controversies. We started out with a few initial projects, civic participation events, an intensive review and all sorts of different aims.

This process alone has been well worth it, because it has given rise to a vision for Chemnitz that understands its own cultural identity. Over the past weeks and months, we have set down the great idea of Chemnitz2025 in an application that we submitted to the Cultural Foundation of the German Federal States, the organiser of the national selection process for European Capital of Culture 2025, on 30 September 2019.