Every design for Paderborn

The name says it plainly: Paderborn comes from the river Pader and Born, an old German word for a spring, and the river rises from more than 200 springs near the cathedral where St. Liborius is buried.

The city sits in the south-eastern corner of the Westphalian lowland bay, where the flat land starts to climb towards the Paderborn plateau and the Egge hills rise to the east. The Pader, Germany's shortest river at just four kilometres, flows north to Schloß Neuhaus, where it joins the Lippe, which also takes in the Alme there. Lakes dot the outskirts, and the old Hellweg trade route, known since the Middle Ages, still runs through the city as the B 1. Inside the centre, the Museum in der Kaiserpfalz, the Diözesanmuseum and the Heinz Nixdorf MuseumsForum sit within a short walk of the springs.

The Museum in der Kaiserpfalz keeps Charlemagne's Paderborn close at hand – reason enough to wear a city whose river begins in the middle of town.