Stuttgart, city, capital of Baden-Württemberg Land (state), southwestern Germany. Astride the Neckar River, in a forested vineyard-and-orchard setting in historic Swabia, Stuttgart lies between the Black Forest to the west and the Swabian Alp to the south. There were prehistoric settlements and a Roman fort in the area of Bad Cannstatt (a suburb), but Stuttgart itself originated as a Stuotgarten, a Gestüt, or stud farm, set up about 950. A wine industry developed, and Stuttgart received civic rights after passing to the counts of Württemberg in the 13th century. It became the principal residence of the counts about 1320, and after 1482 it was successively the capital of the Württemberg county, duchy, kingdom, and state. Prosperity in the 16th century was followed by a decline during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–48) and the French invasions of Louis XIV (1681–84), from which it did not recover until the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century caused rapid expansion.
Stuttgart is an important rail junction on the natural route connecting the Danube River with northern Germany and the Rhine River. It is the centre of the largest industrial zone in southwestern Germany and holds various trade fairs and congresses. The metropolitan area is the site of the world or German headquarters for a number of prominent companies, including Daimler AG and Porsche. The auto industry is at the heart of the local manufacturing sector, but the region is also home to many general and electrical engineering companies as well as firms engaged in clean energy, robotics, and fuel cell and laser technology.
Stuttgart has a port (opened 1958) and has also become an important service centre. The city is well known as a publishing centre and is the home of a number of advertising, marketing, and communication-related firms. One of the largest wine-producing communes (groups of growers who take their grapes to a central location for processing and distribution) in Germany, it has an extensive wine and fruit trade. Stuttgart also has an international airport.
The city centre was almost completely destroyed during World War II, and the rebuilt city has a mix of modern and historic architecture. Historic buildings include the old castle (13th century; rebuilt 1553–78), housing the Landesmuseum; the new palace (1746–1807); the Rosenstein Palace (1824–29), now the natural history museum; the Gothic Leonhardskirche (1463–74), of the hall type; and the Stiftskirche (collegiate church), a 12th-century Romanesque basilica completed in the Gothic style (1436–95). Outside the city centre are Solitude Palace (1763–67) to the west and Hohenheim Palace (1768–85) to the south, now occupied by the University of Hohenheim. Examples of modern architecture include the Weissenhof Estate (1927), the town hall (1954–56), the 633-foot (193-metre) television tower (1955), and Stuttgarter Liederhall (concert and congress hall, built 1954–56).
Stuttgart is the seat of the University of Hohenheim (founded 1818), the University of Stuttgart (founded 1829), and the Stuttgart Institute of Management and Technology (founded 1998). The city contains technological colleges, a number of prestigious research centres, and academies for art, music, and architecture. It also features the state art gallery (whose original 19th-century building was augmented with a noteworthy postmodernist addition, the New State Gallery, designed by James Stirling and inaugurated in 1984), archives, library, observatory, opera, and ballet and the Wilhelma Botanical and Zoological Gardens. The Mercedes-Benz Museum is in the suburb of Untertürkheim, and the Porsche Museum is in the suburb of Zuffenhausen. The suburbs of Bad Cannstatt and Berg are health centres with many mineral springs, from which are exported bottled mineral water, and the famous Cannstatter Folk Festival is held in the Cannstatt Meadows every autumn. Pop. (2011) city, 585,890; urban agglom., 2,206,100.