Tour through the Historic City Center - City of Beautiful Gables

The Historical Town Hall is the centerpiece and landmark of the city. In its picturesque form, it is considered one of the most beautiful in Westphalia. Directly behind it is the Catholic Parish Church of St. Johannes Baptist and opposite is the "Gräfliches Conduvtionshaus".
Further down Klosterstraße is the Local History Museum located in a spacious Ackerbürgerhaus, which features the typical Rietberg "Utlucht". Just a few more meters away, you will reach the former Franciscan monastery with monastery church. The church interior was newly decorated based on historical findings during the latest restoration in 2007. In the Count's Crypt, 12 members of the noble houses of Ostfriesland, Rietberg, and Kaunitz were buried. The monastery garden and sculpture park Wilfried Koch, originally laid out as a walking garden by the Franciscans, now houses the bronze sculptures of artist Dr. Wilfried Koch as a permanent exhibition. Don't miss the opportunity to visit the Art Museum - Museum Wilfried Koch and the small garden behind it. Here you can find the life's work of the Varensell artist with additional sculptures, drawings, and books.
A memorial plaque at the North Gate commemorates the former fortifications of the castle and city, as well as the old bleachery north of the Ems and the moat.
The memorial for the fallen was built in 1923 according to the plans of the Wiedenbrück sculptor Heinrich Püts and expanded in 1936 with an "ancient round temple" with Ionic columns. At the lookout point (at the confluence of the moat and the two branches of the Ems), you can gain an idea of the former fortifications of Rietberg using an information board. In Müntestraße, which developed in the 17th and 18th centuries into a representative residential street for noble officials, you will find, among other buildings, the Lordly House, known as Haus Münte. The baroque building, built between 1744-1746, housed the noble government and served as the residence for the highest administrative official of the Princes of Kaunitz-Rietberg. Since 1903, the evangelical church has been located in the stately half-timbered building opposite, originally a court official's house. Probably from 1814, the Rietberg-born court painter and furniture manufacturer Philipp Ferdinand Ludwig Bartscher lived in the stately late baroque court official's house from 1749 on the right side. The Deelentor at the following house on the left side has a unique shape for Rietberg. The portal is framed by half-figures. Since 2003, the studio of artist Angelo Monitillo, originally from Italy, has been located here. The narrow half-timbered building opposite is Rietberg's oldest residential building.
The towering brick building on the left side of Pochenstraße was built as the Imperial Post Office in 1899, and the stately lordly building on Rathausstraße housed the local court.
The traditional organ workshop Müller/Speith on Im Sack street was founded in 1848 and can be visited by appointment. The half-timbered house where the organ workshop is located is one of the more elaborately designed residences of the noble chancellery officials in Rietberg.
In the next small alley, there are two gardens. In the romantically located citizen's garden, beautiful roses bloom in the summer. Diagonally across on the other side of the alley, the Drostengarten extends, in the middle of which in 2008, a geometrically designed garden with flower beds, hedges, paths, and vistas was created in line with the traditional noble gardens in Rietberg from the 18th century. In the garden, there is a steel sculpture entitled "Full Moon", whose "floating moon halves" under yews and above ivy convey a constantly changing impression depending on the sunlight.
Seven, spaced further apart, wayside shrines with depictions of the suffering and death of St. John of Nepomuk have given the John's Path its name. The brightly white St. John's Chapel represents Rietberg's most significant cultural and historical monument.
Enjoy a view of the Rietberg Fish Ponds Nature Reserve from the observation tower in the "Living Cultural History" park section of the Garden Show Park.