Cologne's ethnological museum on Neumarkt: everyday life, belief, and art from Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Oceania – with a critical look at the colonial era.
September 17, 2026 – December 6, 2026
International contemporary art on loss, displacement, and belonging, including works by Kara Walker and Kader Attia, complemented by a stage, an open workshop, and a community canteen.
The foundation was laid by Cologne world traveler Wilhelm Joest, son of a sugar manufacturer, who gathered several thousand ethnographic objects on his journeys. After his early death in 1897, the collection passed to his sister Adele, who together with her husband Eugen Rautenstrauch donated it to the city of Cologne in 1899 and, in memory of her brother and her husband, also paid for the museum building. Founded in 1901, the museum opened in 1906 on Ubierring in the Südstadt district.
Much of the collection was assembled before the First World War, when Cologne was a center of the German colonial movement. In the Second World War the north wing of the building was destroyed; an extension in the early 1960s did little to ease the lack of space, and the Rhine floods of 1993 and 1995 rendered the underground storage facilities unusable.
After some fifteen years of planning, the museum moved in 2010 into a new building on Neumarkt, sharing its foyer with Museum Schnütgen. The permanent exhibition that opened there compares cultures by themes such as housing, clothing, religion, or death rather than by region, and it earned the museum the Council of Europe Museum Prize in 2012. Today the holdings comprise some 65,000 objects, around 100,000 historical photographs, and a large specialist library.
The return of a toi moko to Aotearoa/New Zealand in 2018 marked the start of a phase of intensive provenance research. Since then, the museum has seen itself as a place for engaging with colonial heritage and is gradually renewing its displays together with source communities and diaspora communities in Cologne.
| Adults | €7 |
|---|---|
| Reduced | €4.50 |
| Children & teens | freefree up to age 5 · Children under 6 accompanied by an adult free; also free: school students, trainees, and Cologne residents under 18. |
| Seniors | –No senior discount listed. |
| Visitors with disabilities | €3.50companion free · Special rates for a degree of disability of 50 or more (permanent exhibition €3.50, special exhibition €5.50, combined ticket permanent + special €7.50, combined ticket with Museum Schnütgen €5); companion free with "B" marker. |
| Students & apprentices | –The museum website does not list individually who is eligible for reduced rates. |
| Groups (10+ people) | €4.50 per personGroup ticket for the permanent exhibition for groups of 10 or more. |
| Families | –No dedicated family ticket; the MuseumsCard Family (€30, two adults and two children under 18) is valid at all municipal museums. |
| Single ticket, special exhibition | €11reduced €7 |
| Multi-visit ticket, special exhibition | €20reduced €16 |
| Combined ticket, permanent and special exhibition | €15reduced €7.50 |
| Combined ticket Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum and Museum Schnütgen | €10reduced €7 |
| MuseumsCard Single | €18two consecutive opening days at all municipal museums, including public transport in Cologne on the first day |
| Annual pass for Cologne's museums incl. special exhibitions | €90reduced €45; without special exhibitions €68 / reduced €34 |
Free admission: KölnTag on the first Thursday of the month: free admission for Cologne residents
Free admission also for KölnPass holders, members of the Museumsgesellschaft RJM, and refugees and those accompanying them.
Step-free entrance with ramp and automatic doors, tactile floor guidance system to the ticket desk and elevator; all exhibition levels reachable by elevator. Accessible restrooms, coat check, and lockers in the basement. Underground parking with accessible spaces and elevator. Two loaner wheelchairs and folding chairs. Sign language video guides free at the information desk; induction loop in the event hall and neck loop for the audio guide. Audio guide partly with descriptive texts.
Great for kids & families
| Kids’ admission | free up to age 5 |
|---|
SPACE4KIDS: free creative and play space for children aged 6 and up (Sat/Sun 11:00–17:00) for building, crafting, playing, and reading. Family tours for ages 6 to 10 (60 min.), children's workshops, and children's birthday parties (approx. 2.5 hrs) through Museumsdienst Köln.
Neumarkt · 2-min walk
Neumarkt (subway/tram 1, 3, 4, 9, 16, 18; bus 136, 146), approx. 2-minute walk.
Paid parking
Public underground parking (Q-Park Stadtmitte) directly beneath the museum, paid, with accessible parking spaces. Tour buses can stop briefly in front of the museum; bus parking on the Rhine riverbank.
According to museen.koeln, the walk from the Neumarkt stop takes about 5 minutes.
Get directionsMuseum café in the foyer and courtyard (Tue–Sun 11:00–17:00, Thu until 18:00) with cakes, snacks, and hot meals. Museum shop shared with Museum Schnütgen.
No information on venue rental found on the museum website.
| Guided tours | yes · approx. 60 min |
|---|---|
| Audio guide | yes (DE, EN) |
| School programs | yes |
| Photography | Allowed for private purposes in the foyer and the permanent exhibition, without tripod or flash |
| Good to know | Free overview tours by volunteers of the Museumsgesellschaft on Sundays at 15:00 and on KölnTag at 17:30. Bookable group tours (60 min., max. 25 people, flat fee of €75 plus admission) through Museumsdienst Köln. Audio guide for the themed route available as an MP3 download and for loan. Entrance through the foyer shared with Museum Schnütgen. |
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