Café Hauptwache, FrankfurtDrove into Frankfurt today to meet the AWCT's Art & Culture group for coffee. We met at the historic Café Hauptwache, directly above the Hauptwache UBahn (subway) station. After navigating a nearby parking garage (driving in these narrow garages still feels harrowing), I found my group. Once again, I got a warm welcome from a very international set of women, with only a few of us from the US.
The real reason I drove, however, was my next stop: Boesner Art. And what an art store! Their tagline is accurate:
Boesner Art Supply: professional artists materials from the international market leader at unusually low prices.
Apparently, they're a wholesaler, although the prices seemed retail (in euros, everything seems reasonable until you remember to add another 40% for the exchange rate). Nonetheless, I received my official wholesale ID on the spot, with my name, address, and barcode efficiently printed onto the little plastic card.
There are two floors of warehouse space, chock full of art materials for every medium: printmaking, painting, sculpture, metalwork, ceramics, woodworking, mozaic, and so on. After wandering around in their massive paper area with my mouth hanging open for awhile, I got my wits about me and started recognizing comfortingly familiar brands such as Arches, Hahnemühle, and Strathmore. Stacked to the ceiling, mind you, but familiar just the same. Along with your fine art and handmade papers, you can buy Kutrimmers, printing presses, and other over-sized equipment that I've only been able to order online in the states.
Boesner's Frankfurt location
There's a nice adhesives selection, where I chose a 1000 ml tub of Guardi dispersion glue, the equivalent of ph neutral PVA - or so the description indicates.
The bookbinding materials are fairly robust for a place that's not a specialty supplier, so I was able to restock my large spool of buchbinderzwirn (binder's thread) that our dog recently ate.
I couldn't resist three little red paper notebooks in different sizes, with old-school blank labels on front.
And then there are the artsy gifts I scored that I can't reveal, in case their future recipients are reading this post.
This was the first of many trips I'm sure I'll be making to Boesner's. It's only 20 minutes from home by car, dangerously close. Today's goal was to find it, and get the lay of the land. Check and check. No more foraging required, now that I've found the mothership.