The Buddenbrookhaus building served as a role model for Thomas Mann's novel "The Buddenbrooks". It can be found on Mengstraße 4 in the centre of Luebeck. It is a patrician's house with a white baroque façade. The lower half of the gable is decorated with two figures.On the left side of the facade there is figure symbolizing "time" and on the right side "prosperity". Above the main entrance, one can see the completion date "in 1758" as well as the inscription "Dominus providebit" (the Lord will make provision). In the year 1986 the house was named "The Buddenbrookhaus" to dignify Luebeck's most famous author and Noble Prize winner, Thomas Mann. Nowadays, the building contains a documentation centre about Heinrich and Thomas Mann. The centre was opened on May 6th, 1993, ninety years after the appearance of the novel which gave its name to the house. A long-term exhibit on the ground floor documents the relationship between the Mann brothers to their hometown of Luebeck. On the second floor is a permanent exhibit, "The Buddenbrooks - A Century Novel ". There is a room with painted landscape wallpaper in warm colours and a thin carpet covers the floor. On the upper floor and in the vaulted cellar, changing exhibits, conferences, film screenings, video presentations as well as readings take place.
The Buddenbrookhaus on the Mengstraße 4 was built in 1758 by Joann Michael Croll. As a patrician's house with a Baroque façade. In 1841 Johann Siegmund Mann acquired the building. He was the grandfather of Heinrich and Thomas Mann. The house remained in the possession of the Mann family until 1891. Thomas Mann's world-famous novel "Die Buddenbrooks" was written here. The Hanseatic city of Luebeck took over the house in 1893 and rented it out. The house also held the cadastral office, the night station for the lantern guards, and the Luebeck state lottery. In 1925 the house was opened as the Buddenbrook bookstore in the presence of Thomas Mann. In 1942, a big part of the house was destroyed by the bomb raidsof World War II. Only the façade and the vault cellar were preserved. In 1954, a bank bought the destroyed building and built a new building behind the old façade, which was opened in 1957 as a branch of the bank. In 1991, the house returned to the possession of the Hanseatic city of Luebeck.