Merkurhaus, Commercial building in Leipzig, Germany

Merkurhaus is a six-story commercial building with approximately 450 narrow shell limestone windows and two bay-like porches on Markgrafenstrasse and Schlossgasse. Today it houses multiple retailers and offices, including a dm-drogerie market and the city transportation service center across its floors.

The site began with August Polich's textile shop, photographed in 1866. Arwed Roßbach built a five-storey department store there in the 1880s, adding a Jugendstil extension around 1898 with a gilded Mercury on the corner tower. After bankruptcy proceedings in 1932 and 1934, C. & A. Brenninkmeyer bought the firm at a forced auction and had it demolished; Karl Fezer designed the present building, erected in 1936/1937.

The name recalls the gilded Mercury figure with winged helmet, caduceus and winged shoes that stood on the corner tower of August Polich's department store. Locals long called the 1936/37 building the Brenninkmeyer-Haus after the C. & A. chain that commissioned it. The bay-like projections on both long sides echo Leipzig's Baroque oriel tradition.

The narrow end faces Petersstrasse at the corner of Markgrafenstrasse, with the long sides running between Schlossgasse and Markgrafenstrasse; the rounded southeast corner marks the junction. Ground-floor retail such as the dm drugstore and the Leipzig transport service centre sit beside office and physiotherapy tenants on the upper floors, so entrances and access differ by use.

The gilded Mercury figure with winged helmet, winged shoes and herald's staff stood on the corner tower of Arwed Roßbach's historicist department store for August Polich, and the name outlasted that building's 1936 demolition. The first escalator in Germany, built by Unruh & Liebig of Penig, ran here in December 1898.