House of Heads

Built in 1609 for the shopkeeper Anton Burger, the house of heads is attributed to the architect Albert Schmidt, who also made the former protestant presbytery and the house of the St. John's Knights. The house of heads, a fine building dating from the German renaissance, owes its name to the 106 heads or grotesque masks that decorate a rich façade on which stands also a three-storey bay window. The gable of the building is decorated with volutes and the statue of a cooper, sculpted in 1902 by Auguste Bartholdi, who responded to an order of the wines Exchange that had moved into the building in 1898. The house of heads has been restored in 2012.