The Frankenwald in northern Upper Franconia is Franconia's least known beer region. The small breweries here have no tourist ambitions and brew exclusively for their immediate area. Travellers who go off the main routes find brewery inns whose beers appear nowhere else.
Frankenwald at a Glance
- Upland forest region in northern Upper Franconia
- Border with Thuringia — a genuine cultural borderland
- Main towns: Kronach, Ludwigsstadt, Pressig, Steinwiesen
- Naturpark Frankenwald: walking, cycling, very quiet
- Little-documented, rarely crowded
Beer in the Frankenwald
The Frankenwald has a small number of independent breweries producing local Lagerbier and Märzen for the surrounding pubs and Gasthöfe. They do not appear in most beer guides. They rarely have websites with current opening hours. They are found by driving through villages, noticing signs, and asking at the pub whether the brewery is still active. Almost all of them are.
This is the honest character of beer in the Frankenwald: not a curated experience, but a continuation of something that has been happening quietly for a long time.
Kronach
The district capital of Landkreis Kronach, known for its impressive fortress (Festung Rosenberg) and as the birthplace of painter Lucas Cranach the Elder. Kronach has a small brewery scene; the local lager is available in most of the town's pubs. It is not a beer pilgrimage destination — but a pleasant small town with genuine local beer and one of Bavaria's most impressive medieval fortresses overhead.
The Thuringian Border
The Frankenwald was divided by the inner-German border until 1989. The cultural traces of that division are still visible — in the towns, in the infrastructure, in the way people talk about the region. The beer culture of the Frankenwald has influences from both sides: Upper Franconian lager traditions on one side, the brewing culture of Thuringia (Erfurt, Gotha) on the other. The result is something that does not fit cleanly into either category.
Who Should Go
The Frankenwald is for travellers who have covered the main Franconian brewing regions and want to understand how far the culture extends. It is for people who find the absence of tourist infrastructure a feature rather than a problem. The beer here is not exceptional by any standard measure — but it is honest, local, and found in places that most visitors never reach.