University of Freiburg - Campus

Campus

Having grown with the city since the 15th century, the university's buildings are deeply intertwined with the city. There are three large campuses (the university center next to the historical city center, the institutes quarter and the engineering campus), but other buildings can be found scattered throughout Freiburg.

The university complex in the historical center of Freiburg contains such picturesque buildings as the Jugendstil Kollegiengebäude I, built in 1911 by Hermann Billing, and the gothic revival old university library. The current University Library is also located in the historical center; it is a monumental building erected in the 1970s, and is to be renovated and redesigned beginning in September, 2008. It is one of the largest in Germany and placed 4th in an October, 2007 German national ranking of university libraries.

The University Church, located across from Kollegiengebäude II, was built in 1683 by the Jesuit order. The church and the Jesuit college were handed over to the university after the Jesuit order was suppressed in 1773. The church was destroyed in the November 27, 1944 bombing raid on Freiburg, and reconstructed in 1956.

The “institute quarter” (Institutsviertel) is home to the science faculties. This campus was destroyed almost completely in the Freiburg bombing raid in 1944. After World War II, the reconstruction of the institutes began. Today, the quarter houses the physics buildings, the tall main chemistry building, visible from afar, the famous Institute for Macromolecular Chemistry at the Hermann-Staudinger-Haus, various other science buildings, as well as the renowned pre-clinical institutes of the Faculty of Medicine.

The engineering campus is located next to the small Freiburg airfield to the northwest of the city center, close to the University Medical Center. The campus is home to the IMTEK (Institut für Mikrosystemtechnik, Department of Microsystems Engineering) and the Department of Computer Science. With the addition of the Faculty of Engineering, the University of Freiburg became the first classical university to combine traditional disciplines with microsystems technologies.

The University Medical Center Freiburg (Universitätsklinikum Freiburg) is one of Germany's largest medical centers. It boasts 1,600 beds and handles 55,000 in-patients a year, with another 357,000 being treated ambulatorily. It consists of 13 specialized clinics, 5 clinical institutes, and 5 centers (e.g. Center for Transplantation Medicine). The University Medical Center achieved many technical advances, such as the first implantation of an artificial heart Jarvik 2000 (2002).

Most recently, the University of Freiburg purchased a large historic villa in the district of Herdern, which will house part of the literature and linguistics as well as history departments of the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS).