Today I am invitedt to visit the Klassik Altstadt Hotel in Lübeck. To establish a bed & breakfast hotel was always the dream of Hilke Flebbe’s mother. A native of Hamburg, she was drawn back to northern Germany after the death of her husband in London. In 1978, she acquired the property in Fischergrube and opened a hotel garni, but did not live to see the reopening of the house after extensive renovation in 1984 following her untimely death. The only daughter, Hilke, then 22 years old, a law student at Cambridge, accepted the great challenge, moved to northern Germany, and step by step realized her mom’s dream, which became her own.
Start in the maritime quarter of Lübeck
Three houses were merged for today’s Klassik Altstadt Hotel . It is located in the former seafarers’ quarter and thus in a part of the Old Town that has always offered smoky pubs and music and was a bit crazy and quite wicked in the Middle Ages. Here were various bathhouses – around 1300 Lübeck had about 16 – where people bathed together, played music and ate food and drinks directly in the tub. Here business was initiated and there was incidentally – charmingly formulated – opportunity to “eliminate the loin pain”. There was also a public bathhouse within the walls of today’s Klassik Altstadt Hotel at the beginning of the 13th century. It is also known from documents that an anchor smithy was operated in this ideal location not far from Lübeck harbour until the late 19th century.
Breakfast with history
The management of the hote is committed to this exciting history until today. Thus, the invitingly designed facade in late classicist style was preserved. In front of the entrance are large-sized Gotland pavement slabs of limestone. Particularly intriguing are a historic brick wall and a massive wooden beam in what is now the breakfast room. Centuries old. How many people have sat, worked, lived under the beam! Today I am sitting here with Hilke Flebbe.
Everything Made in Lübeck
The connection to Lübeck was and is very important to the owner. Thus, she commissions only craftsmen from the region. The most recent extensive renovation involved the windows throughout the house. Everything “Made in Lübeck” and carried out in close coordination with the monument authorities. Her focus is on quality and individuality. In every respect. Thus, each of the 11 double rooms tells the story of a famous person from Lübeck. In the 17 single rooms, the guest will find travelogues by various authors from the last centuries who dedicated themselves to Lübeck, and a “teamaker” – quite in keeping with the family’s British background.
In the breakfast room, you can see how the hotel manager carefully gives space to the history of the house with a great sense of colour and creative details. She slept in each room once during the lockdown to experience it from the guest’s perspective and made small adjustments where necessary. Incidentally, the core team has been in place since the opening of the Klassik Altstadt Hotel. The chef has been loyal to the house for a good 20 years. This is one of the reasons why the family-run hotel has a large number of loyal regular guests. The breakfast buffet is particularly popular. This is due to the fresh products, but above all to the fact that Hilke Flebbe does not miss the opportunity to be personally present early and to entertain her guests with hotel anecdotes from more than 35 years if they like to hear them. These insider’s stories about Lübeck would also be nice for one of the upcoming episodes of our podcast Lübeck ZWISCHENTÖNE.
Passionate hostess and cultural manager
Hilke Flebbe clearly inherited her love of culture and literature from her mother, who loved the theatre and, in the late 1970s, hosted actors and actresses in her hotel garni for guest performances at the nearby Lübeck Theater. Hilke Flebbe is well-read and a cosmopolitan. Whatever she starts doing, she always works with heart and soul. In 1997, Günter Grass celebrated his 70th birthday in her hotel and became a kind of mentor to her. “Read the Buddenbrooks and you know the people from Lübeck,” was his advice. Every January, Grass met with the translators of his works at the Klassik Altstadt Hotel. So not surprisingly, the most beautiful suite in the Klassik Altstadt Hotel under the roof is the “Günter Grass Suite”. It was attentively enlivened by Hilke Flebbe with details relating to Grass’s work and activities. In 2018, the tireless cultural manager established the Salon Festival in Lübeck.
The nationwide initiative encourages cultural and political exchange. It is also a real concern of hers to offer a platform to local authors and artists. This is how the “Theatre in the Room” came into being during the months of the lockdown.
Hilke Flebbe also developed the online format “Reading with Distance” in the hotel room.
“Connected to the Past, Towards the Future.”
Motto of the hotel founder and the motto of the house today
The “feel-good godmother”
But despite all of her activities, her guests are in the focus of her attention. While talking with her guests the experienced hotel manager senses what type of person is sitting in front of her. Which recommendation she can give him, which very individual advice for an excursion or a cultural experience could make him or her make happy. It also happens that after a regular guest has checked out, she discovers an open book from the hotel library in his room and makes a note so that the next time he visits, he will find the same book on his table. This little remark alone, which I hear in a rather incidental sentence during our conversation, tells so much about this committed Lübeck woman. She describes herself as a “feel-good mentor” and shows herself as she is: vividly formulating, humorous, jumping from one flash of inspiration to the next.
In the meantime, son Alexander works as general manager in the hotel. The succession is therefore already secured. Not that Hilke Flebbe already wants to retire. Quite the opposite. She is full of plans, works as a travel journalist and regularly shoots short videos, for her blog, which should inspire potential guests with insider tips for Lübeck and her boutique hotel. It’s quite possible that you’ll run into her in Lübeck.
A few weeks ago, she and Axel Schattschneider were out and about in Lübeck’s craftsmen’s quarter:
