Dresden has so many stories to tell, with its lovingly restored baroque buildings, its proud artistic and musical history and its network of rich pine forest and parkland patches, which spread between the Medieval streets and down to the romantic Elbe Valley. It's therefore hardly a surprise that the city's Christmas market is one of the best loved and most atmospheric in Germany.

The market first opened in the 15th century, when Dresden first became the seat of the Dukes of Saxony, so it has accumulated more than half a millennium's worth of unique traditions. These include the baking of a four-ton Christmas stollen a lethally yummy, crystallised-fruit-packed, marzipan stuffed glory which is paraded about the streets in the company of the privileged young woman chosen as the 'Stollen Girl', before being shared amongst the revellers at the Striezelmarkt in the city centre. This is where you'll find around 250 stalls offering gifts, decorations and the usual tasty, seasonal goodies but mostly traditional craft items. The Striezelmarkt is definitely the one to choose if you'd love to have Lauscha blown glass, Lusatian indigo-ink-printed fabric, incense-burning 'Rauchermannchen', nutcrackers, Dresdener ceramics, candle-powered Christmas pyramids, Schwiboggen advent lights and wood carvings from the Ore Mountains.

Besides a giant cake, you'll also see a super-sized Advent calendar in the shape of a fairytale castle, puppet shows, a 65-foot Christmas tree and an only slightly smaller six-tier Christmas pyramid, decorated with life-size figures.

Written by  larapiegeler.

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