Town hall, Historicist town hall in Schwerin, Germany

The Schwerin town hall stands on the Markt on the site of predecessors documented since 1338. Its west front is a crenellated Tudor-style facade added in 1835 to designs by Georg Adolph Demmler, with two corner projections and a gilded equestrian figure of Henry the Lion on the central merlon. Behind it are 17th-century timber-framed gables and roof sections built from the 14th to the 20th century; a medieval archway leads to the Schlachtermarkt.

A town hall on this site is documented from 1338. Fires in 1531 and 1558 destroyed the Gothic building; a Renaissance replacement followed in 1567, its tower finished by 1575. After the 1651 fire, a plainer half-timbered building rose by 1654, funded by donations collected across the Empire. Georg Adolph Demmler added the Tudor-style market facade in 1835; the building lost its role as town hall at the end of the 19th century.

The building now houses the Stadtmarketing Gesellschaft Schwerin GmbH and its tourist information office. The Demmlersaal, formerly the model room, hosts city council meetings. The gilded equestrian figure on the central pinnacle, set there in 1744 by coppersmith Albert Paltzoss and gilded by painter Johann Christian Busch, shows Henry the Lion, the city's founder.

The building stands on the Markt in Altstadt Schwerin; the medieval arch at its rear leads through to the Schlachtermarkt. The city administration and mayor moved to the Stadthaus on Am Packhof in 1998, and the tourist information run by Stadtmarketing Gesellschaft Schwerin GmbH is now housed here. City council meetings take place in the Demmlersaal, formerly the model room.

The golden equestrian figure on the central pinnacle, set there in 1744 by coppersmith Albert Paltzoss and gilded by painter Johann Christian Busch, shows Henry the Lion, the city's founder. The medieval archway below is the only surviving piece of the building that stood here before the fires of 1531 and 1558.